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CHRISTIAN 
PSYCHOLOGY ; 

A NEW EXHIBITION OF THE 

CAPACITIES AND FACULTIES OF THE HUMAN SPIRIT, 

INVESTIGATED AND ILLUSTRATED FROM THE 
CHRISTIAN STAND-POINT, 



Y 

REV. GEORGE SUTHERLAND, 

PASTOR OF ST. GEORGE'S PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, SYDNEY, 

AUTHOR OF "THE LORD'S SUPPER,"'"' "BAPTISM," '^URGENT APPEALS TO THE 

UNSAVED," ETC. 



■ 



SYDNEY : 

WILLIAM MADDOCK, GEORGE STREET 5 

MELBOURNE, GEORGE ROBERTSON; ADELAIDE, W. C. RIGBY 

DUNEDIN, N.Z., H. WISE; BRISBANE, WATSON AND CO. | 

HOB ART TOWN, WALSH AND SON. 

MDcccr.xxiv. 



aw? 



SYDNEY : 

A. -\V. RKAltn. PBINTE11, BEX FRANKLIN OFFICE, 

311 GEOROK STREET. 



y#/ Right a Reserved. 



PREFACE 



Next in value to the noble science of Theology is the important 
science of Psychology. This science treats of the soul of man 
— his powers, capacities, condition, and consequent duties. As 
man, however, possesses a body as well as a soul, the full con- 
sideration of his nature embraces the two cognate sciences of 
Physiology and Psychology, the one treating of his material frame- 
work, the other of his spiritual endowments. From the nature of 
the subject, Psychology takes precedence over Physiology. 

Although this science has occupied the minds of many superior 
writers, in different ages, it has not hitherto attained that maturity 
or settled stability which could ensure a future steady progress. 
What has been set up in one century has been pulled down in the 
following. And now in this generation we meet a revival of old 
exploded heathen notions on this subject, in the form of a pantheistic 
or materialistic philosophy, having great pretensions to learning, 
which impose on the half-educated, but is really the natural outcome 
of an infidel rationalism of the past generation. Refusing the aid of 
Heaven's revelation, such writers are justly rewarded by being- 
landed in ancient heathen darkness. 

The author was led to the investigation of this extensive and 
difficult subject from the duties of his office, as an expounder of the 
doctrines of Christianity. Meeting in the sacred volume with the 
term " Conscience," as expressing a power which should regulate 
human conduct, the questions arose : What power is this ? What 
authority does it exercise ? What was its original purpose, and what 
its present condition ? Questions relating to Conscience soon led to 
questions relating to the Emotional nature, the Intellect, and the 
Will. Unable to find satisfactory answers in all the works w-ithin 
reach, and constrained to differ widely from the arrangement, 
treatment, and general conclusions adopted by some of the mos 



iv. Preface. 

distinguished authorities on this science, the resolution was formed 
to explore the whole field from an original and independent position. 
The result is before the reader. It is not the production of a day, 
"but of years. All real progress in the philosophy of mind is made 
by a careful induction of particular exj)eriences, intellectual, emo- 
tional, executive, and normal. The man who can read, distinguish, 
and enumerate most accurately and completely these experiences, 
in the widest and most varied field of operations, can contribute to 
the science of Psychology what will prove a lasting acquisition. 

Accepting the Scripture as the production of Him who made man, 
the author explored the hidden and intricate chambers of the human 
soul, with the light of human experience on the one hand, and of 
divine revelation on the other ; and he is not ashamed to add with 
entreaties for the illumination of that Great Spirit who gave to man 
all his spiritual powers, and by whom they are all well known. By 
such means dark paths may be illumined, and intricate perplexities 
resolved into order. In Nature's high- way, the explorer never fails 
to breathe the free atmosphere of Heaven's revelation, but when he 
leaves the one or the other, he is entangled in a thicket, or gropes 
in a mine. 

The hope is entertained that this work will advance the science of 
Psychology, by stripping the subject of that obscurity, perplexity, 
and purely speculative treatment, which has debarred ordinary 
minds from entering on its consideration ; and that the departmental 
order, divisional arrangements, discussion, and illustrations, will 
meet the approbation of those who desire to see an important science 
assume a form of stability and progress. And not less, that the 
views of man's character and duty, of his fallen condition and of the 
method of Divine restoration, herein set forth, may result in the 
most intense longings for the restoration of that spiritual image 
which was once his distinguishing glory, and may again become his 
everlasting renown. 

141, Darlinghuest Road, Sydney, 
New South Wales, 

September 2nd, 1874. 



CONTENTS. 



DEPARTMENT 1. 



CHAPTER. 
I. 



II T. 
IV. 

V. 



VII. 
VIII. 



INTELLECTUAL CAPACITY. 

Introduction — The Human Spirit a subject of 
prof oun d interest 

1. Apprehension — Perception, Conception, Com- 

prehension 

2. Application — Attention, Penetration 

3. Distinction — Division, Abstraction 

4. Distribution — Appropriation, Classification, 

Symmetrization ... 

5. Construction — Architecture, Composition, 

Imagination, Syllogization 

6. Deduction — Sagacity, Ratiocination ... 

7. Inquisition — Introspection, or Consciousness, 

Examination, Retrospection, or Memory, 
Search, Prospection 

8. Exhibition — Presentation, Parabolic and Sym- 

bolic Representation 

9. Retention — Capacity, Grasp 



Page. 



21 
32 
37 



45 

52 

58 



67 

79 

86 



DEPARTMENT II. 
EMOTIONAL SUSCEPTIBILITY 





DIVISION I. 


— AGREEABLE EMOTIONS. 


XI. 


Introductory— 


-The Emotional Nature . . . 


XII. 


1. Gratitude 




XIII. 


2. Hope 




xrv. 


3. Love 




XV. 


4. Joy 




XVT. 


5. Pride 






DIVISION II.- 


—DISAGREEABLE EMOTIONS 


XVII. 


6. Shame 




XVIII. 


7. Hatred .. 




XIX. 


8. Envy 




XX. 


9. Jealousy . . 




XXI. 


10. Anger 




XXII. 


11. Grief 




XXIII. 


12. Pear 




XXIV. 


13. Depression 





92 
101 
107 
113 
123 
128 



135 
142 
149 
157 

164 
170 
177 
183 



vi. 






Contents. 


Chaptbk. 












DIVISION III. 


— INDEFINI 


XXV. 


14. 


Sympathy 




XXVI. 


15. 


"Wonder ... 




XXVII. 


16. 


Zeal 




XXVIII. 


17. 


Desire 





Page. 

192 
202 
209 
217 



XXIX. 
XXX. 



XXXII. 
XXXIII. 
XXXIV. 



DEPARTMENT III. 
THE EXECUTIVE POWER. 

Preliminary Observations 226 

Notice oe Opinions on the Nature of the 
Will — Descartes, Locke, Leibnitz, Edwards, 

Reid, M'Cosh, Hodge 234 

Examination op Theories on the Condition 

OF THE WlLLtfN THE ACT OF DETERMINA- 
TION 249 

Freedom and Ability 259 

Definitions and Illustrations 271 

Relation of the Will to Morality 291 



DEPARTMENT IV. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY. 

xxxv. Self Regulation in the Works of God ... 302 
xxxvt. The Nature of the Normal Faculty — Review 

of classified opinions ... ... ... ... 316 

Section 1. The Normal Faculty a Divine Ele- 
ment. 
Cicero, Seneca, Epictetus, Antoninus ... 138 

Section 2. The Normal Faculty — the Intellect 
in exercise on moral subjects. 

( udworth, Clark, Price, Kant 320 

Section 3. The Normal Faculty regarded as an 
Emotional operation. 

Hume, Smith. Mcintosh, Brown 328 

Section 4. The Normal Faculty, an introversion 
of thought and comparison with a moral 
standard. 
Puritan Divine, Sibbes, Ward, Goodwin, 

Charnock, Clarkson ... ... ... 332 

Section 5. The Normal Faculty, a Growth, a 
Habit, the result of Education and Public 
Opinion. 

Paley, Chamber's Encyclopedia 338 

Section 6. The Normal Faculty, a Regulating 
Power variously endowed. 
Chrysostom, Hierocles, Butler, McCosh, 

Wayland 342 



Contents. 



VII 



CHAPTER. 

XXX VII. 

XXX VIII. 

XXXIX. 



XL. 
XLI. 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty 

Original Design and Authority 

Present Condition of the Normal Faculty, — 

1. Unenlightened. 2. Perverted. 3. Torpid. 

4. Troubled. 5. Quiescent 

Restoration by Grace 

The Divine Psychology 



Page. 
349 
363 



375 
403 
412 



DEPARTMENT Y. 
HABITUDES. 

xlii. Intellectual Habitudes. — 1. Clearness of 
Apprehension. 2. Quickness in Calculation. 
3. Readiness in Composition. 4. Acuteness 
in Distinction. 5. Comprehensiveness in 
Grasp. 6. Promptness in Judgment . . . 424 

xlih. Emotional Habitudes — Division I. — From 
Single Emotions. — 1. Piety. 2. Self-Sus 
tenance. 3. Patriotism. 4. Benevolence 
5. Happiness. 6. Confidence. 7. Thankful 
ness. 8. Haughtiness. 9. Compassion. 10 
Enthusiasm. II. Curiosity. 12. Covetous 
ness. 13. Timicjitv. 14. Modesty. 15, 
Irritability. 16. Sadness 436 

xliv. Emotional Habitudes, continued. — Division 
II.— From Combined Emotions— 17. Indus- 
try. 18. Courage. 19. Ambition. 20. 

Revenge. 21. Cheerfulness 451 

xlv. Executive Habitudes— Introduction. 1. Swift- 
ness. 2. Slowness. 3. Firmness. 4. Fickle- 
ness. 5. Orderliness. 6. Disorderliness ... 457 

xlvi. Normal Habitudes— 1. Subjection. 2. Authority 467 

XLvrr. Conclusion — Moral Dispositions Progressive and 

Determinative ... ... ... ... ... 472 



Index 

Scripture References 
Eminent Men 



477 
479 
480 



Note. — The figure on the cover is an original device to represent 
the tessarene endowment of the human spirit. 



ERRATA. 

Page 118. For "part" read "garb" 

.. 217. For " Isaiah xix. 7 " read " Isaiah xix. 17 ' 

,. 852. For " halem " read " shalem " 

.. 358. For " exegeties " read "exegetics" 

.. 860. For "Timothy i 5 " read "1 Timothy i. 5.' 



CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY. 



CHAPTER I, 



INTRODUCTION 



THE HUMAN SPIRIT A SUBJECT OF PROFOUND INTEREST. 

The whole creation of God presents a vast field for 
interesting and profitable investigation. To man in his 
present stage of existence, only a circumscribed portion 
of this field is opened. His investigations are confined 
mainly to this earth, which is his temporary abode, and 
to himself, its sole, visible, intelligent occupant. Any 
knowledge of other worlds revolving in space in com- 
pany with this earth, or in regions beyond this system, 
and of invisible intelligences of other grades visiting or 
haunting this earth, or occupying other spheres, is 
necessarily restricted and imperfect. His present do- 
main offers to man wonders more than sufficient to 
engage his curiosity and task his powers of thought 
during the brief period allotted to him here. 

Of all these wonders he is himself pre-eminently the 
chief; and of that marvellous compound of matter and 
spirit which constitutes the human being, the first place 
beyond question must be assigned to that department 
which embraces man's relation to a governing Power 
and to his fellow subjects of that Power. Hence, while 
examining into every department of the human spirit, 
and bringing to light each faculty in its place and power, 



io Christian Psychology : 

special attention should be given to this mysterious link 
of connection with the supreme governing Spirit, with 
the view of presenting in the plainest language all that 
can be apprehended of a spiritual endowment, in which 
is bound up man's honor and welfare for time and 
eternity. 

When a survey has been made of man as a spiritual 
intelligence, it will be found that he is endowed with 
two great capacities, one intellectual and the other emo- 
tional, each possessed of a variety of separate energies 
or faculties ; the one designed for the acquirement and 
utilizing of knowledge ; the other for the infusion of 
energy in action, and for the safety and happiness of 
the sentient and intelligent being. With these two 
great capacities of thought and feeling are associated 
two prominent energies or powers, the Executive power 
and the Normal faculty; the one the energy by which 
the soul can grasp, control, and direct one or several of 
its own powers, mental and bodily, on any particular 
object or pursuit ; and the other the energy or faculty 
which claims to be head and chief, a governing power, 
stimulating or restraining, approving or condemning, 
soothing or lacerating the soul, according to its light 
and sensibility on any particular design or action, and 
ever as a deputy assuming to reflect the judgment and 
feelings of a superior moral power. 

To discover and distinguish each faculty in its place 
and relation to others, and to trace its development and 
operations singly and in combination with others in 
what is a spiritual substance ever-changing and of 
restless activity, a unity in complexity without tangible 
parts, is a task which they only can estimate who are 
endowed with sufficient mental power to subject their 



Introduction. 1 1 

own spirits to thorough, oft-repeated, protracted, and 
patient investigation. Nor must this investigation be 
continuous or secluded from the activities of life. Un- 
broken application will either disorder the mind, or make 
the particular department or faculty, which is the subject 
of study, assume proportions which are unnatural, and 
therefore untrue. The mind requires to be frequently 
relaxed from every pressure, that it may regain its 
elasticity, and recover the full orb of unburdened 
energies. 

The psychologist with intellectual faculties burnished 
and invigorated, subjects man to closest observation. 
His movements are carefully pondered, with the view of 
apprehending the true condition and action of the 
moving power within. He is the object of keen dis- 
criminating reflection, whether alone or amidst a crowd ; 
whether with a mind unbent developing an untutored 
nature, or with an intellect wrought to highest effort in a 
favorite study ; whether bravely struggling with diffi- 
culties or calmly floating on the stream of prosperity ; 
putting forth his utmost energy to avert a catastrophe, 
or calmly musing in inactivity; depressed and saddened 
by increasing disease, or rejoicing in the exuberance of 
health; the object of pitiless contempt, or of loudest 
applause ; agitated with emotions as the storm-tossed 
ocean, or unruffled as the mirror-like lake ; whether 
fickle as an aspen leaf from defective executive power, 
or firm as a rock from a strongly developed will ; 
whether yielding to unlawful emotion he does violence 
to his moral nature, or, recognising the authority of God, 
he nobly takes his stand in maintenance of truth and 
right, and braves all threats of human violence : and 
not in the extremes only, but in every intermediate 



1 2 Christian Psychology : 

stage of the swiftly or slowly oscillating emotions and 
volitions. From this painstaking scrutiny over this 
wide field of observation, are the facts gathered from 
which the mental chart, with its clearly defined bound- 
aries and prominent natural features, is faithfully drawn 
up. 

To the cultivated and mature intellect nature reveals 
treasures of fascinating power, which are veiled from 
the untaught and undeveloped mind. What order, 
beauty, forces, and analogies rise up before the admiring 
gaze of the spirit brightened by patient study and en- 
larged explorations, as he wanders through this beautiful 
creation of God ! Place the educated man beside the 
thundering cataract, and he sees before him not merely 
the rush of mighty waters, but the law in operation by 
which the material universe is kept in order. Bring 
before him the beauties of earth, and sea, and sky, in 
the gorgeous flower, the beautiful shell, and the brilliant 
rainbow, and he traces all their glory to one source, the 
fountain of earth's material beauty, the sun. Let the 
lightning flash before him, and he sees Heaven's ap- 
pointed messenger for man to bear his tidings round the 
globe more swiftly than the hurricane. Suspend the 
quivering needle in his sight, and he detects the guide 
chosen for the wanderer on sea and land more service- 
able than sun or star, obscured by no clouds, and 
indifferent to the return of night. Let him gaze on 
the wide-spread pastures of our fertile lands, and he 
admires nature's soft and moisture-loving covering for 
her soil, the carpet ever spread for the repose of the 
weary limbs of animals, and the furnished table, often 
adorned with flowers, for the nutriment of those which 
are most useful to man. Lead him to the face of an 



tntroduction. 13 

exposed cliff, where the strata of various deposits are 
clearly marked, and he is borne back in thought to by-gone 
ages when mighty denuding agencies swept over our 
globe, scraping the tops of mountains, scooping out val- 
leys, heaping up mounds of gravel and clay, and burying 
vast stores of vegetable matter; and when these over- 
whelming waters left the work unfinished, volcanic fires 
burst up the encumbered strata to bring their rich 
deposits within the grasp of man, and poured forth 
their own contribution to the fertile soil of earth. 
Above all, let him stand on ocean's shore, and look out 
on the seemingly boundless waste of waters, his soul 
expands in the contemplation as he endeavours to grasp 
its vast area, and explore its mysterious caverns, and he 
sees the great conserver of animal and vegetable life on 
this planet, the fountain of its springs, the source of its 
rivers, and the waterer of its fields; and as the billows 
dash beneath him, an idea of immense power rises 
within his soul ; what weight could not these waters 
bear up, and what could withstand their onset when 
impelled by earthquake violence ! And turning the eye 
of his intelligence to the domain of life, what adaptation 
to place, rank, and circumstances appears throughout 
the vegetable and animal kingdoms, from the lowly 
mushroom, the product of a night, to the towering 
Wellingtonia, the growth of three thousand years, and 
from the feeble earthworm, forcing with difficulty its 
way through the soil, to the powerful elephant, rejoicing 
in trampling down the forest ! And as the mind con- 
templates all this wondrous beauty, variety and life, 
desires spring up within the heaven-quickened soul 
which find their utterance in language such as this : 
Where is the Great Spirit which spread out, animated, 



14 Christian Psychology : 

and beautified this earth as man's abode ? Where is 
God, my maker; would that I could approach Him, and 
that He would commune with me ! 

In vital connection with this high intellectual endow- 
ment by which knowledge is obtained, classified, recon- 
structed, and retained, is a fountain of feeling, powerful 
and variable, the stimulator of vigorous thought, speech, 
and action. Touch the ebullient elements of this foun- 
tain, and thought no longer creeps the earth with slow 
and painful progress, but mounting on the wing scours 
the earth and sea, the hills and plains, in search of men- 
tal food ; speech flows forth with continuous stream, 
and action becomes resolute, passionate, and even des- 
perate. How diverse and how variable the streams of 
this fountain ! Here flows the placid stream of love, 
refreshing and blessing all as it glides noiselessly along, 
there the turbid torrent of hate, disturbing and defiling 
all against whom it dashes. One moment the child 
deplores with streaming eyes the loss of a favorite toy, 
the next the gleam of joy shines through these unwiped 
eyes for the discovery of the much prized object. One 
hour the sea warrior inspired by rage is straining every 
muscle to destroy every living soul on board the ship of 
his antagonist, the next animated by compassion he 
exhausts every effort to rescue from death the survivors 
of that same ship which he has sunk in the ocean. Let 
a sound strike the ear, and this fountain of feeling is 
touched, the frame quivers, terror seizes the man, and 
flight is instantaneous, exhibiting in the case of a multi- 
tude all the desperation of a panic. Let the gleam of 
the military rocket fall upon the expectant eye, the 
signal is recognised for the assault on the besieged 
fortress, zeal bursts into ardour in every heroic breast, 



Introduction. 1 5 

and thousands of men impelled to utmost effort rush 
forward into the jaws of destruction, determined to wrest 
the stronghold from the foe or perish in the attempt. 
At times this emotional nature displays its exuberance 
by a double stream of feeling. As distinct intellectual 
faculties co-operate when the mind is roused to ardent 
exercise, so distinct emotions combine their streams and 
overflow the soul when the fountain of feeling is unusu- 
ally stirred. The steady silent look of a fellow-man, 
reminding of ingratitude and crime, may cover the soul 
with shame, instantly followed by an overflow of grief, 
and their combined dark and bitter waters may inundate 
the soul for days and weeks. The sight on the door-step 
of a dear relative absent for years, unheard of and given 
up as lost, evokes at once an outburst of wonder which 
cannot subside before it is blended with a copious out- 
flow of joy, which together disperse their bright and 
sparkling waters over the whole spirit. The public 
mention of a name as that borne by a successful rival, 
conjoined with the honours to which he has attained, 
excites in the mind of the narrow and inconsiderate a 
feeling of envy, and this cannot rest till it has evoked as 
its companion its twin-sister hate, and they flood for 
hours the unhappy spirit with their green and deadly 
waters. Emotions having no natural affinity combine 
to save the life in the hour of peril. A man is washed 
overboard from his ship. Instantly fear demands every 
effort to save himself from drowning. But another 
emotion, hope, rushes to the rescue, and pointing to the 
wheeling ship and lowering boat, thrusts under him her 
sustaining arm, and together with fear upholds the 
drowning man till his comrades have seized him and 
drawn him into their boat. 



1 6 Christian Psychology : 

Now mark this human intelligence displaying his 
world-subduing energies, and thereby establishing his 
claim to be regarded as the lord (Ps. viii. 6) of this lower 
world. Unable to perform his work with his unaided 
hands, he fashions wood, stone, and metal, as his in- 
struments. Finding his strength insufficient to whirl con- 
tinuously the mill-stone, or to ply the oar, he obstructs 
the winds in their flight, and constrains them to drive 
his machinery, and bear his ships over the seas. Per- 
ceiving the mighty power of water, he treasures up its 
strength in reservoirs, and leads it out as a willing 
servant to saw his timber or to grind his corn. Dis- 
covering the fiery impulse of steam, he carefully pro- 
duces it, and curbing and controlling the giant power, 
compels the puffing and impetuous worker to plough his 
fields, to thresh his corn, to card and spin his wool, to 
weave and dress his cloth, to saw and plane his timber, 
to load and unload his ships, and do an endless amount 
of work wholly beyond the limits of human strength. 
And pressing beyond the visible, he makes the magnetic 
current guide him over trackless seas and untrodden 
wilds, and despatches the electric spark with lightning 
speed to bear his message over continents or oceans. 
Restricted in his personal movements, and dissatisfied 
with the speed of the swiftest animals, he launches his 
steamship, or mounts his steam-car, and traverses 
thousands of miles of sea or land in a week. Impeded 
in his enterprize by formidable physical obstructions, he 
calls into exercise his constructive skill, and wide rivers 
are bridged, massive stone piers built, despite deep 
water and powerful currents, lofty mountains perforated 
by tunnels miles in length, and oceans are united by 
channels cut for the passage of ships. 



Introduction. iy 

But occupying a higher and more important place 
than either thought, feeling, or energy, as stimulating 
and often controlling every subordinate faculty of the 
soul, is the moral principle in man. This is that faculty 
which recognises the existence of a superior Being as 
ruler and lawgiver ; and which seeks to subject and con- 
form the whole man to the conceived will or law of this 
higher Being. An idea of relation lies at the foundation 
of all morality. This faculty is the judge of actions 
conceived to have a relation to law; in other words, of 
moral actions. But it is much more than a judge, as 
shall be seen in its proper place. It is distinguishable 
from reason or deduction, which is the forming of a 
judgment from a perception of the true relation of one 
thing to another, or of one or more parts to a whole, 
submitted for consideration ; and also from feeling, as it 
is often the exciter or soother of acute feelings. Under 
its prompting, the soul employs both : calling upon the 
intellect to examine the relation betwen a certain act 
and an acknowledged law, and declare its judgment, 
which however it may or may not accept ; and bidding 
feeling rise into a tempest or settle down into a placid 
calm, according as that act has been contrary to or in 
accordance with that law. Although often permitting 
the inferior faculties of the soul to follow their impulses, 
as if it had closed its eyes and retired to slumber within 
the recesses of the soul, it can, when appealed to, and on 
great occasions, come forth from its retirement, and 
assume at once the bench and the seat of authority in 
the soul, giving the most prompt decisions on questions 
of right and wrong, and the most peremptory orders — as 
the pilot to the man at the wheel — on the slightest 
deviation from the true course. To see man as the 



1 8 Christian Psychology : 

deputy-lord of this world, we must see him take his 
stand under the impulse of what is commonly called an 
enlightened conscience. Then we behold him realizing 
the presence and recognising the authority of the great 
invisible Lawgiver, immovable as a rock amidst a 
tempest-tossed ocean. We hear him reply to an earthly 
sovereign's demand, that he should disregard the law of 
this invisible King, in the words of the Hebrews to their 
monarch on the plains of Babylon, in view of the fiery 
furnace : " Be the consequences what they may, we 
will not worship thy golden image " ; and with Luther, 
at Worms : " My conscience is a captive to God's word, 
and it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. 
There I take my stand ; I can do no otherwise. So help 
me, God. Amen." And we see him as a man of veracity 
and honour, blind to all the endearments of home, deaf 
to the entreaties of friends, and regardless of life, unless 
unstained with dishonour, return like Regulus on his 
parole, to the disposal of his foes, now doubly inflamed 
by his high-toned and self-sacrificing patriotism. He 
may be in error, but he follows only what he conceives 
to be right, and that sanctioned by supreme law ; and 
under this conviction he will give his body to the flames, 
or to be devoured by wild beasts, rather than do violence 
to his moral nature. 

And follow the random exercises of this buoyant intel- 
ligence, as untrammelled by material weights it disposes 
of space and time. In an instant it crosses the widest 
ocean, and looks out from the opposite shore. Spreading 
its wing, in a moment it has alighted on the moon, 
and begins to climb its rugged mountain steeps. Dis- 
satisfied, it bounds off, and in a few seconds it stands on 
the dark surface of the sun, and gazes with awe on its 



Introduction. 19 

atmosphere of flame. Alarmed, it rushes through the 
first dark opening, and in a moment, espying the largest 
planet in the system, rests upon Jupiter. Restless still, 
it seeks the region of the stars, and floating over their 
milky way, it endows each star with satellites, and 
pauses to admire how gloriously they move, till, wearied 
by the boundless vision, it gladly returns to rest within 
its native home. Now he seizes the records of memory, 
and in a moment the pages revolve to the scenes of his 
childhood. The door-step where he sat and played ; the 
brook where he waded, or the fields where he roamed ; 
the table where he took his food, and those who sat 
beside him ; the school-house, its forms and their occu- 
pants, with the presiding genius ; and then the hour of 
leaving home ; the strange abode and occupation ; and 
then the passing of some lovely form that left an 
impress not to be effaced, but constantly returned, bring- 
ing a troop of pleasing emotions ; and then there pass 
and pass those lights and shadows till some passing 
sound reminds the absent that the duties of the hour 
demand his attention. Again, unoccupied and at ease, 
he glides out, and with creative skill, clothes the earth 
with the softest verdure, surrounds himself with a beau- 
tiful grove hanging with garlands, a brook mumurs at his 
feet, soft breezes laden with perfume regale him ; when, 
lo ! a shining speck appears at his feet, he stoops to 
examine — it is gold ! He has alighted on untold 
treasures : visions of wealth, grandeur, and glory, now 
float before him ; a splendid estate ; a beautiful mansion 
and high honour ; — a gleam of benevolence arrests him, 
and a church and hospital are endowed, and rising in 
liberality for its attending honour, the debts of city, pro- 
vince, and nation are paid off ; and then his name 



20 Christian Psychology : 

becomes a household word, a score of towns adopt it, 
public halls are adorned with his portrait, and at the 
close a lofty monument is erected to his memory, when 
earth's utmost boundary being reached, the fascinating 
reverie slowly dissolves, and, as 

"The baseless fabric of a vision, 
Leaves not a wreck behind. " 

A spirit so variously and so richly endowed, must ever 
constitute a subject of deep interest to the thoughtful. 
Next to the knowledge of that Being who gave us exist- 
ence, and of His government under which we live, 
should we rank an intimate acquaintance with the facul- 
ties with which we are endowed, and the condition in 
which we live. We may indeed perform the ordinary 
duties of life without an accurate knowledge of our men- 
tal powers, just as we may perform the important 
function of walking without a knowledge of the bones 
and ligaments which form our knee and ankle joints ; 
but an investigation of our spiritual endowments, and of 
our physical structure, would add greatly to our ability 
for the healthful and profitable employment and conser- 
vation of both mind and body. Our faculties are limited, 
but fully adequate to the duties imposed on us in our 
present state of being. They ought to be wisely and 
fully employed. To do this, our mental attributes, 
emotional susceptibility, executive power, and moral 
nature must be carefully cultivated and guarded. 
Especially should it be our aim to restore our highest 
spiritual distinction and glory, the Normal faculty, to 
that close and vital contact with the supreme moral 
Intelligence of the Universe, that every thought, feeling, 
and act might be pleasing in His sight. 



DEPARTMENT I. 

INTELLECTUAL CAPACITY. 



CHAPTER II. 
1— APPREHENSION 

BRANCH FORMS : 

PERCEPTION — CONCEPTION COMPREHENSION. 

A careful examination of the exercises of the human 
spirit may enable us clearly to discover an intellectual 
capacity occupying the very front of man's spiritual 
energies, and this attended by an emotional suscepti- 
bility, and associated in vital connection with both, an 
executive energy ; while all three are presided over by a 
legislative and judicial authority. 

These capacities or powers may properly be desig- 
nated : the Intellectual, Emotional, Executive, and 
Normal Faculties. 

Besides these, there are certain habitudes or acquired 
powers, the result of a special development, perversion 
or neglect of some faculty, generally an emotion, which 
often press into their service the chief energies of the 
soul. Although not classified with the natural or original 
powers, their great influence on the individual and 
on society demands their distinct recognition and treat- 
ment by the psychologist. 

In this chapter we begin our investigation of man's 
intellectual capacity. Let us define our terms. What 
do we mean by intellectual capacity ? — We mean that 



22 Christian Psychology : 

capacity by which man acquires, classifies, applies, 
retains, and displays knowledge. What is this per- 
sonal knowledge ? — It is a conception, or the sum of 
acquired conceptions, on any or every subject of 
thought. The idea or conception formed may differ 
from the truth or reality of any subject, that is, the 
knowledge may be false ; yet the mind accepts it as true, 
and regards it as an acquisition until further information 
deprives it of its assumed value. Knowledge may thus 
be true or false — reliable or unreliable ; and it is the 
business of the educated, and of those who would be 
wise, to distinguish the true from the false — the valuable 
from the worthless. 

How is our knowledge obtained ? — Both through the 
senses and by independent mental exercises. From the 
earliest dawn of intelligence, two distinct impressions, 
convictions or ideas, are formed within the mind. The 
one is the impression or conviction of its own personal 
existence and individuality ; the other, of a world or 
nature external to itself. As the child advances in years, 
its mental capacity is enlarged, and the impressions 
from the external world are multiplied. One sense aids 
another, or, to speak with more accuracy, the mind 
employs one or more senses to confirm or disprove the 
conception formed by an impression on another sense. 
The sense of touch assists that of sight. The artificial 
flower appears so natural that we must handle it to cor- 
rect the conception. The sense of sight confirms the 
sense of hearing. When we think that we hear the voice 
of one out of sight whom we know, and are anxious to 
verify our apprehension, we move from our place till our 
eyes can rest upon the speaker. Taste or smelling may 
disprove the conception formed from sight. What 



Apprehension. 23 

appears to be loaf-sugar, may, by taste, be proved to be 
salt. What appears to be medicine, may, by smelling, 
be known to be poison. So singularly impressible is the 
mind that it is constantly receiving impressions by sight 
and hearing, of which it apparently takes no notice at 
the time, but which may be discovered and called up at 
some future time by their connection with certain con- 
ceptions of which the mind had taken notice. But when 
in search of information, or when arrested by something- 
interesting, it has formed conceptions, tested and proved 
them, they are considered as a treasure, and laid up as 
such. While these stores are accumulating, the mind is 
ever distinguishing ideas which differ, and carrying back 
these distinctions into its hidden recesses. As occasion 
demands, these ideas are brought forth, either in their 
simplicity, or blended in beautiful harmony, interwoven 
into a theory, or displayed in forcible reasoning ; exhi- 
bited as a picture, or employed as apt illustrations. 

But in all these acts of gathering, arranging, adorn- 
ing, and exhibiting, the mind is one and indivisible — like 
a flame, often, indeed, burning low, but again shooting 
upwards with great vigour : at one time throwing out 
its whole strength in one direction, then again exhibiting 
a full-orbed outline ; sometimes launching up a bright 
jet, as if some hidden reservoir of oil had been tapped, 
and then again displaying the brilliant coruscations of 
genius on every side. How interesting, to watch and 
mark this ever active and undying spirit, in its ever- 
varying acts and attitudes ! We must calmly question 
it, and ask it to throw open its recesses and show us all 
its treasures of knowledge, and tell us how it obtained, 
and how it arranged them, and by what powers it can 
reconstruct, exhibit, dispose of, and yet retain them. 



24 Christian Psychology : 

Let us begin at the foundation. By what power of 
mind is the simplest perception formed of something 
external to itself ? — By that power which, as furnishing 
the hands by which the mind grasps the external world, 
we designate Apprehension. By it the mind lays hold 
of the impressions which have reached it through the 
senses, and forms ideas or thoughts, which are Percep- 
tions, Conceptions, or Comprehensions, more or less 
distinct, respecting them. The grasp is mental. With 
the seizure of the impression, there is in most cases an 
instantaneous apprehension of the idea or thought, of 
which the impression is the vehicle or symbol. In its 
simplest form the mental apprehension, as grasping an 
idea, is called a Perception. The mind has, in an 
instant, grasped, as it were, the spirit conveyed to it in 
a certain form. The form may be immediately lost sight 
of, as of no consequence, while the living thought is 
detained, as of permanent value. When the impressions 
are novel, and the symbols not easily intelligible, the 
mind may seize the impressions, but be unable to form 
a distinct and satisfactory idea of their import. In these 
cases, other powers of the mind are called in to aid this 
faculty. When a satisfactory idea, whether true or 
false, has been reached, after more or less examination, 
and the aid of other intellectual powers, the Apprehen- 
sion is properly designated a Conception. Often the 
utmost efforts are unavailing to form a satisfactory 
conception, and the man may be heard saying, " I 
cannot grasp the meaning — I cannot understand the 
writing!" When two or more subjects are presented 
together having a relation to one another, the appre- 
hension of their character and relation may be designated 
a Comprehension. We perceive what is simple ; we 



Apprehension. 25 

conceive what is intricate ; and we comprehend what is 
varied and extensive. 

Impressions often reach the mind, which it cares not 
to apprehend ; of which, in common speech, it takes no 
notice. Familiarized with certain sights and sounds, it 
heeds them not ; carried away by some interesting- 
thought, it is regardless of what is said or done in its 
presence ; fatigued by labour, it refuses to stretch a hand 
to lay hold of what is pressed upon its acceptance. A 
man may live beside a cataract, and become so accus- 
tomed to the sight and sound of the torrent, that the 
ordinary duties of out-door life may be performed from 
day to day without a solitary thought formed from the 
voice of nature sounding in his ears. It would not be 
thus with him when first arrested by the roaring waters ; 
and if removed far from the spot, lofty ideas of 
nature's grandeur might again, at times, rise within 
him. Looking from an eminence, a person may gaze 
with pleasure on wide-spread fields, with interspersed 
cottages and orchards ; when, in a moment, the par- 
ticular form of one cottage opens the gate for a 
mental excursion ; years fly past as a flash of light- 
ning, and the soul hurries through and around a 
house of former years, as if anxious to meet some 
one long loved and lost ; and while thus absorbed, 
the eyes are open, but no field nor farm is seen. A friend 
speaks — the ears are open, but no sound is heard : the 
mind is regardless of impressions laid at its door. Or, 
again, it is the Sabbath-day and the house of God. The 
preacher is not dull, nor the hearer indisposed to listen. 
But the body is wearied by protracted labour, and the 
mind drowsy ; or to speak more accurately, the organ of 
the mind — the brain — is fettered. Thus hampered, the 

B 



26 Christian Psychology : 

intellect allows whole sentences of the sermon to pass, of 
which it takes no notice. The articulated sounds rush 
upon the ear in succession — the brain is impressed, — but 
the mind stretches no hand to seize the impressions, and 
they seem to pass away without leaving behind a trace 
of their visit. I do not say that these sentences leave 
no impression on the mind. Perhaps it would be more 
correct to say that they have passed a sleepy sentinel 
unchallenged, and instead of being comprehended and 
appointed to appropriate quarters, they have located 
themselves in some hidden recess of the immortal spirit, 
from which they may come forth in eternity, if not in 
time, with all the freshness of the Egyptian paintings in 
the ruined palaces of Thebes. 

But taking the mind in its ordinary mood, as follow- 
ing, and vitally and variously grasping, the impressions 
made through the senses, let us illustrate this power of 
Apprehension, as called into exercise by the senses of 
Touch, Hearing, and Sight. 

The sense of Touch is extended over the whole body. 
It is generally so keen that the piercing of the fine point 
of a needle or the flap of the wing of an insect is 
instantly reported to the brain, and awakens apprehen- 
sion. It is most valuable in preserving life. You may 
be walking under a scorching sun, when a sensation of 
unusual heat in the crown of the head warns you that 
danger is near, and you seek shelter without delay. Or 
you may be driving in a sleigh over the frozen regions 
of the north, when a peculiar numbness in the feet is 
forced upon the attention of the mind, and means are 
used to prevent your feet from being frozen. Or, you 
are camping at night at some distance from home. 
You go out in the dark to gather sticks to make a fire, 



Apprehension. 27 

when your hand, while feeling for the object of your 
search, grasps something soft and supple ; in a moment 
the mind apprehends that you have seized a snake, and 
the next instant the object is dropped. You may be mis- 
taken : a visit to the spot in daylight may reveal that a 
piece of bleached rope occasioned your alarm. But we 
blame neither sense nor intellect — danger was appre- 
hended, and the right action taken. The mind is respon- 
sive to the sense of touch, when temporarily deprived of 
the organs of sight and hearing. Stretch yourself beside 
a fire in the winter season, in a forest, and fall asleep. 
After a little, the sense of cold on the one side, or of heat 
on the other, communicates its notice of discomfort to the 
brain ; the sleepless mind apprehends the complaint ; 
and orders are given to the organs of motion to change 
sides. Or a hand, clothed in fur, is laid upon your face. 
With the vigilance peculiar to one accustomed to forest 
life, you are startled, and spring up, under the apprehen- 
sion that the paw of a wild animal has been placed on 
your cheek. Where sight is impossible, by reason of 
darkness or blindness, the mind seizes with special 
acuteness the impressions from touch. A sailor is 
ordered aloft in a very dark night while the ship is 
labouring heavily in a storm. His sense of touch tells 
him where he is ; when he has reached the crosstrees ; 
when he has touched the yard, what rope he has seized ; 
when he has placed his foot on the footropes, and what 
brace, or stay, or sheet, can be leaned on with safety. 
The blind man is largely guided by apprehensions of his 
whereabouts received through his staff. Aided also by 
hearing, he may move about with confidence over 
ground with which he is familiar. Experience promotes 
facility of apprehension. The printer may close his eyes 



28 Christian Psychology : 

while standing before his case of types, and set up whole 
sentences, knowing by the sense of touch every type and 
space and point of punctuation. He may then read by 
feeling what he has set up, inverted though it be. Thus 
the blind are taught to read by passing their fingers over 
raised type, the mind at the same time, while in contact 
with matter, comprehending the import of these sym- 
bols. Those dealing in manufactures of silk, cotton, 
or wool readily perceive by handling, their quality, 
strength, and finish. And, to pass over illustrations 
innumerable, how often is it apprehended that the stream 
of life has ceased to flow by a pressure of the finger on 
the pulseless wrist. 

To apprehensions obtained through Hearing, we are 
much indebted for safety, information, and pleasure. 
The fire-bell rings at midnight. We are roused from a 
profound slumber by its startling sounds. At once the 
mind apprehends fire and its consequence danger, for 
with these peculiar notes the idea of fire has become 
associated in the mind. We rise to see where it is, and 
are alarmed to find that it is in our immediate neighbor- 
hood, and demanding our instant attention. Or as sol- 
diers in active warfare, we may have lain down on the 
earth, during the hours of darkness, to rest our weary 
limbs after a toilsome march, when, in an unexpected 
hour the bugle blast is heard calling to arms in haste. 
Apprehensions of the assaulting foe possess the soul, 
and every man is ready to defend himself to the utmost. 
The seaman hears the fog whistle, or the surf on the 
shore, when the land is obscured by mists, and alters his 
course or casts his anchor in time to save his vessel. 
How often has the cry of distress been answered by 
prompt relief ! We apprehend that some one needs 



Apprehension. 29 

succour, and we hurry to the spot to rescue the drown- 
ing, to save one exposed to the flame, or to give help to 
the oppressed. Who can estimate the quantity of infor- 
mation laid down at the doors of the intellect by this 
pneumatic train ! Conversation pours in its packages 
for daily use. Lectures drop their occasional bales of 
mental manufactures. Speeches thrust upon us their 
multifarious cases in behalf of public policy, justice, and 
mercy. And sermons spread before us their selections 
of heavenly truth for the regulation of our conduct. 
Much, indeed, may pass not apprehended, or misappre-* 
hended ; but much is also laid hold of and applied to 
immediate use, or stored up for future benefit. And what 
conceptions of harmony, liberty, and joy are formed 
from the pleasant sounds that reach us. We hear the 
merry laughter of children at their play, and we appre- 
hend the freedom, simplicity, and joyousness of childhood. 
We listen to the songs of praise of a great congregation, 
adoring their Redeemer, and conjoined with our appre- 
hension of the praise, there is an elevation of spirit ; 
and, it may be, a vivid conception of the adoring multi- 
tude before the eternal throne. A single note is borne to 
our ear in the stillness of the evening ; we pause to 
hear ; other notes are wafted on ; we apprehend, and 
recognise the tune as an old favourite : the memories of 
the past rush in, and visions come and go, while the 
brain is thrilled with the melodious vibrations of the 
atmosphere reaching from a distance. 

Through the organs of Sight, as through flood-gates, 
streams of information constantly flow to the reservoir 
of the mind. These organs are ever employed taking 
photographs of objects before them, on which the mind 
may afterwards look at leisure after the objects are 



30 Christian Psychology : 

removed from them. How amazing the capacity of the 
intellect for storing these away without confusion ! 
Every intelligent traveller can recall the pictures of the 
scenes which have deeply impressed him. No reckoning 
can be made of the innumerable facts of nature appre- 
hended by the soul which have reached it through this 
illumined passage. Let the astronomer spend the night 
in the clear atmosphere of the equinoxes, when from an 
unclouded sky the brilliant lights of heaven send down 
their far-reaching rays. What apprehensions of distance, 
of magnitude, of motion, and of glory, are formed in that 
intellect which can measure these heavens ! Let the 
botanist roam over a field stocked with the varied 
productions of the vegetable kingdom, how is he de- 
lighted in recognising well-known forms of beauty, and 
how arrested and interested in what seems to baffle his 
skill to classify. We pass the wonders of animal life — of 
chemistry, of mineralogy, and of geology — and leave you 
to reflect on the countless thoughts and ideas to which 
a vision of their forms and movements, their colours 
and combinations gives rise. But we may not pass the 
world of information obtained by reading. Here most 
strikingly the power of apprehension, in its triple form, 
is exercised. The eyes glide from line to line, from sen- 
tence to sentence, and from page to page, the mind all 
the time keeping pace, and taking hold of the treasures 
of thought as they reach it through the printed symbols, 
and often proceeding a step further, and forming an 
opinion, favourable or unfavourable, of what it has 
apprehended. No voice is heard ; the very silence is 
conducive to ready apprehension. Before these avenues 
of light are brought these exponents of wisdom, divine 
and human, of ages past and present, which the grasping 



Apprehension. 3 1 

spirit so covetous of knowledge, hesitates not to appro- 
priate. Poetry, history, oratory, science, and theology 
deposit their rich stores by the same swift vehicle. So 
fascinating to the intellect do some pages appear, that 
the mind seizes them with an eagerness not surpassed 
by that which a starving man displays when seizing food 
offered to him. And so greedy of knowledge is this 
voracious spirit that it often works these doubly-refined 
instruments until they are either paralyzed by fatigue or 
totally destroyed. But generally they perform an 
amazing amount of work, with patience and power down 
to the close of life — lighting the path of the spirit 
through the past, the present, and the future, as these 
appear in legible records, conducting it through unknown 
geological periods, round the orbits of the planets, 
leading it up to the lighted glories of paradise and 
down to the gloomy recesses of the pit of despair. 
And, as if anxious to perform the last kind office, as the 
fashions of earth are passing for ever from its vision, it 
enables the soul from the pages of inspiration to appre- 
hend a region where boundless explorations of surpassing 
interest shall be opened to it by the light of an eternal 
day. 



Christian Psychology 



CHAPTER III. 
2,— APPLICATION. 



BRANCH FORMS 



ATTENTION— PENETRATION. 



Following a natural order, the next intellectual power 
is, 

Application. — The mind is universally known to pos- 
sess the power, when in a healthy state, of applying itself 
to any object or subject to which pleasure, interest, or duty 
may engage it. Steady application receives the -name of 
Attention ; and close and persistent application assumes 
the form of Penetration. Attention and penetration are 
advanced forms of Application. Illustrations teem in 
every day life. The school-boy knows that he cannot 
work out a difficult question in arithmetic, or master a 
problem in geometry, without close application. And 
how long must he pore over books of dead languages 
before he can become familiar with their terms and 
skilful in their grammatical construction ! He must bend 
his mind to the task, and keep steady at it — not for 
months merely, but for years. And how little progress 
can be expected unless attention is given to the 
instructions and directions of those whose knowledge and 
experience entitle them to the honourable position of 
teachers. The naturalist, in his rambles, discovers in a 
stratum of gravel the fragment of a bone, or a strange 
flower in the retired gorge of a mountain, and straight- 



Application. n 

way applies his mind with all diligence to find out the 
particular species of animal or of plant to which the 
discovered object belongs. With what assiduity will 
men prosecute a favourite branch of science ! They will 
exhaust mind and body, expend a fortune, and occupy a 
lifetime in persistent application to a particular study. 
If opportunity is afforded they may explore the Antarctic 
ocean, and climb the Himalayas, as did Sir Joseph 
Hooker, to enlarge the known domain of a chosen 
science. How much of the progress in the arts and 
sciences is due to application. To it we owe many of 
our chief discoveries in every department of knowledge. 
Its power has been strikingly displayed in antiquarian 
researches. Not only have tombs and temples and 
palaces long buried from sight been exhumed and 
explored, but the far more difficult task of reading their 
strange inscriptions has been mastered. Close and 
prolonged application has enabled the mind to bring its 
utmost sagacity and penetrating power to bear upon the 
unravelling of the mystery, and it has succeeded. The 
hieroglyphics of Egypt and Mexico are read, and the 
arrow-headed inscriptions of Nineveh and Babylon are 
interpreted. Champollion bent his penetrating intellect 
to decipher the Rosetta stone. Were the hieroglyphics 
ideographic only, or were they phonetic also ? Years 
were spent in oft-repeated applications to solve the mys- 
tery. Young, the acute mathematician, threw out the 
suggestion that the hieroglyphics were exponents of 
sound as well as of ideas. Started on the right track, 
the penetrating Frenchman pressed his way to conclu- 
sions which were declared the greatest discovery of the 
century. The hieroglyphics were traced into the 
hieratics, and these into the demotics ; and it was then 



34 Christian Psychology : 

seen and proved that the hieroglyphics were not simply 
pictures containing ideas, but a junction of syllables 
also, in which a sign stood for a letter. To Grotsfend, 
of Hanover, belongs the honour of discovering the clue 
by which the cuneiform writings of ancient Assyria have 
been read. He tried key after key, until the mysterious 
lock responded to the skilful and persevering applicant 
in words of intelligence. Where philology was wanting, 
archaeology and history came to his help ; and his 
unwearied application was rewarded by the deciphering 
of several well-known names. But it remained for those 
who came after to prosecute these researches. To the 
distinguished Rawlinson belongs the high honour of 
not only reading long and important inscriptions, but of 
adding largely to our knowledge of the history, grammar, 
law, and mythology of the ancient Assyrians, Medes, 
and Persians. In his opinion, the alphabet is both 
ideographic and phonetic. Let it not be supposed, how- 
ever, that the whole exploration is completed. Much yet 
remains to task this noble power of intellect in this 
mysterious antiquarian lore. 

We see attention leaning on her sister patience in the 
laboratory where the chemist watches the results of his 
experiments, in the constant changes of colour, weight, 
and form produced by his decompositions and combi- 
nations. Mark the acute and enterprising Humphrey 
Davy as he applies his tests for the decomposition of 
earths or alkalies. What attention, what close appli- 
cation is displayed, while one discovery after another 
opens before his enraptured vision. The gases were 
made his special study. Their utility and their danger 
were alike tested. Under his penetrating intellect the 
secrets connected with the growth and nutriment of 



Application. 35 

plants were made familiar to the public ; and those who 
toiled in foul air and in constant danger, far below the 
surface of the earth, reaped the results of his skill and 
benevolence in the far-famed safety lamp. 

We see the same power in the unwearied observations 
of the astronomer during the long hours of night, and 
specially when some unusual occurrence is passing. 
With what close and prolonged application must Nicolas 
Copernicus, the Prussian mathematician, have studied 
the movements of the heavenly bodies before his famous 
work, " De Revolutionibus Orbium," was completed. 
For over twenty years the work was on hand, receiving 
the development and finish which his utmost ingenuity 
and skill could afford. Nor did he fail in the reward of 
fame. The Copernican system bears testimony to the 
world-wide appreciation of his labours. He revived a 
long-forgotten theory. In the midst of much that is 
crude, fanciful if not ridiculous, he has demonstrated 
facts of the greatest importance in confirmation of his 
main position that the sun and planets did not move 
round the earth, but the earth and planets round the 
sun. It was left to the illustrious names of Kepler, 
Galileo, and Newton, to carry on to something like 
perfection the discoveries and calculations which have 
placed the theory on an immovable basis. As a modern 
illustration of the same power of intellect in the same 
noble science, we may point to Leverrier, whose exact 
observations led to the prediction of the precise position 
in which the unknown planet Neptune would be found. 
And this very year (1874) there will be a world-wide 
exercise of this faculty in the form of the closest 
possible Attention, in astronomical observations, to the 
transit of Venus across the face of the sun. 



$6 Christian Psychology : 

Penetration sometimes displays astonishing feats in a 
detective force. A singular robbery or murder has been 
committed, and all trace of the perpetrator seems to 
have disappeared. All the known facts, with every 
minute circumstance attached to them, are laid before 
the man whose office it is to ferret out criminals. Past 
experience, with every mental power that can aid, places 
its services at the call of application. The mind 
embraces the disjointed whole, until it has discovered in 
some incident the embryo of the scheme, the vitalizing 
centre which unites all parts, and points beyond mistake 
to the agent in the deed. In every department of duty, 
secular and sacred, the utility of this power is apparent. 
So important is it, that he who possesses it largely 
developed, is likely to overcome all that is surmountable, 
and he who is deficient in it is unstable as water and 
cannot excel. 



Distinction. 37 



CHAPTER IV. 
3.— DISTINCTION, 

BRANCH FORMS '. 

DIVISION ABSTRACTION. 

Our third intellectual attribute is 

Distinction. — The mind may not only apprehend 
what is presented to it, and apply itself most diligently 
to comprehend what has been unknown, or only partially 
apprehended, but also distinguish the subjects which 
differ from each other in what is brought under its 
notice. It readily distinguishes in things material, as 
colours and forms, and less readily in things mental, as 
ideas, traits of character, and trains of reasoning. The 
bolder distinctions of colour delight alike the child and 
the savage ; the finer shades attract the cultivated mind 
of the artist. The florist revels amidst a profusion of 
the beauties of nature. The artist deems it the highest 
attainment to copy the lights and shades, the brilliant 
and the sombre, the prominent and the recessed in 
nature. What a glorious painter is the sun ? With 
one stroke of his beams he paints the heavens, earth, 
and sea with a combination of colours as he rises to 
chase away the gloom of night. Who that has ever 
beheld a sun-rise in the tropics in favourable circum- 
stances, from the sea shore, can forget it. The clouds 
above are gorgeous, as if the very beauties of para- 
dise were opened to view ; the sea is sparkling 



38 Christian Psychology : 

with its countless rainbow drops ; and all that is 
beautiful and fresh on earth holds out its gayest 
colours. Our ability to distinguish is the secret spring 
of our joy. To the geometrician a mere point or 
straight line has little attraction. But give him the 
angle, the square, and the circle, and he will expend his 
ingenuity in his distinction of figures. The angle will 
assume every form, from the most acute to the most 
obtuse ; the square will be changed into every shape 
which a four-sided figure can assume ; and the circle 
will descend from its own perfection by successive 
stages to the most elongated ellipse. Man delights to 
exercise his skill in distinctions — to draw his circles 
within his squares, and his squares within his circles, 
and his angles within both. Yet the right angle, the 
square, and the circle, are all perfect, and every step of 
alteration is a step of reduction to the dull uniformity 
of a straight line. What power of distinction must the 
great Alexandrian mathematician Euclid have possessed 
when his figures and angles remain till this day, after 
the lapse of more than two thousand years, the wonder 
and delight of those who have made geometry their 
study. Close application, rigid discernment, and vivid 
distinction must have marked a mind so peculiarly 
gifted in apprehending the relation of parts to a whole, 
under every conceivable form of representation. The 
sculptor or carver cultivates the power of distinction. 
He will not give to every bust the same depth, breadth, 
and prominence ; nor will he form the cheeks, nose, 
and mouth of each face on the same model, but will seek 
to bring each feature by the finest touches to the closest 
approach to the original in nature or imagination. 
In all the departments of natural science, the wider 



Distinction. 39 

distinctions of species are readily marked by the unculti- 
vated, but it requires the practised eye, or in more 
correct language, the practised mind, to detect at once 
the finer distinctions where the points of similarity may 
be numerous. In proof of this, see the varied and 
splendid results of the labours of the distinguished 
naturalist, recently deceased, Louis Agassiz, in the field 
of ichthyology. Brought in contact, at an early period 
of life, with collections of fish gathered and preserved 
by travellers in South America, the talent with which 
he was so richly endowed was called into requisition ; 
curiosity was excited ; interest and ambition prompted 
to the exploration of a wider field ; the finny tribes of 
Europe became the subject of closest investigation ; 
when the living and modern had been explored, the 
ancient and fossil engaged attention ; the new world, as 
well as the old, was ransacked for all that was rare and 
distinguishing ; life, in its wider range, became the field 
of study, as the wonders of nature opened before the 
cultivated and inquisitive mind ; and a career of utility 
and honour begun by the cultivation of this faculty of 
distinction, was closed in mature age in the very first 
ranks of the savants of natural history. 

The distinction of ideas is exclusively a mental 
exercise. Those whose business lies with thought and its 
expression have constant recourse to this indispen- 
sable faculty. The power and elegance of writing 
depend upon the clear distinction of ideas which are 
appropriate to a subject, and the selection of terms 
which are best adapted to express these ideas. In the 
acquirement and formation of an unwritten language, as 
spoken by many barbarous tribes, this power is ever in 
demand. The modification of every term must be 



40 Christian Psychology : 

distinguished, and the circumstances under which the 
modification takes place. And when the task of the 
lexicographer is undertaken, a main reliance must be 
placed on the ready and vigorous use of^this faculty. 
To its exercise, long and carefully cultivated, we 
owe what may be considered as the most complete 
lexicon of our language. After twenty-one years 
of close investigation of the origin and structure 
of our language, Noah Webster gave to the world his 
monument of diligence and skill in the distinction of 
ideas as they are clothed in what now constitutes 
modern English. This period was appropriated to 
the preparation of the lexicon, but for more than 
twenty years previously the same faculty was occupied 
with the examination of the grammatical peculiarities 
of a language by no means free from puzzling irregula- 
rities. Endowed with this power in large measure, the 
dramatist describes, in terms that seem to live, each 
feature of human character, from the most simple to 
the most subtile ; and from the stainless to the double- 
dyed leopard. His keen sagacity in distinguishing the 
real from the pretended in the most difficult circum- 
stances, and detecting ulterior designs carefully con- 
cealed under present appearances, and dividing to each 
the clothing most natural to his mental offspring, elicits 
our admiration. 

Not less striking is the skill displayed by the 
casuist. We do not refer to the morality of his 
questions, but to that analysing power by which the 
same subject can be presented to the mind under an 
endless variety of forms from countless circumstances 
or suppositions. An illustration of this gift, both 
amusing and instructive in no common degree, can be 



Distinction. 41 

found in M Pascal's Provincial Letters." Pascal was 
one of the brightest lights to which France, a land rich 
in men of rare genius, has given birth. In him the 
moral nature received high culture, side by side with 
the intellectual. Born, and brought up in the church of 
Rome, he died within her pale. But his noble thoughts 
of God, the soul, and eternity, soared far beyond the 
limits of a sect. They belonged to the wide field of 
eternal truth. With a conscience educated in the 
fundamental principles of truth and right, and a piercing 
intellect that distinguished the real from the apparent 
as if by a glance, he was enlisted by friendly connection 
to lay bare the maxims of Jesuit morality, then sapping 
the foundations of integrity. With art and skill, play- 
fulness and humour, truth and accuracy, he has 
presented arguments dressed in the garb of ridicule, 
that are as invincible as they are amusing. Yet all their 
point and force spring from the keen and scathing 
distinctions of the casuist. 

This power is also the right arm of the metaphy- 
sician. Before him as a subject lies what appears 
a tangled mass of thoughts and feelings, volitions 
and decisions, how can he reduce to order this com- 
plexity. There is, indeed, variety and complication, but 
there is also unity and order. The mind is a world 
in itself, and its variety in unity, and its order in 
complication occasion the great difficulty in fully 
comprehending and exhibiting it. It will, however, 
yield to sharp-sighted distinction, aided by patient 
application. Its powers will yet be enumerated and 
arranged, a task not hitherto accomplished in a manner 
to secure general satisfaction, although some of the 
secret springs of action may still remain a mystery to 



42 Christian . Psychology : 

mortals. Few have attempted a task of such difficulty 
without being called to it as a public duty. All useful 
writers on the subject have had their peculiarities. 
Some, like Reid, have been marked by strong common 
sense ; others, like Thomas Brown, for singularly subtle 
analysis ; others, like Kant, for vigor of penetrating 
thought ; and a few like Hamilton, for combined com- 
prehensiveness and penetration. The successful explorer 
will need to possess, in measure at least, each of these 
peculiarities. It is not the man of one-sided genius 
that can map out this intricate complication. Vigor, 
penetrating power, comprehensiveness, shrewd common 
sense, patient investigation, and -high power of distinc- 
tion belong to the useful and successful psychologist. 
But it must not be forgotten that a perfect vision of 
the human soul in all its movements, attributes and 
relationships belongs to the Omniscient (J ere. xvii., 10). 
In the lawyer we see an embodiment of this faculty. 
His official life is made up of distinctions. It is his to 
see that no foreign element be allowed in the evidence 
against his client. It is his to detect all false trains of 
reasoning, every lurking fallacy, and every illegitimate 
conclusion. He sits with mind intent to note every 
departure from accuracy in the opposing counsel, and 
mark every salient point from which the adversary 
may be dislodged. Distinction performs its highest 
service to man when it aids the Normal faculty to decide 
aright. The intimate connection between the intellect, 
especially the power of distinction, and the Normal 
faculty have led some metaphysicians to deny the 
existence of a separate Normal faculty, and others to 
invest the Normal faculty with distinct intellectual 
power peculiar to itself. Both, in our judgment, are 



Distinction. 43 

wrong. The Normal faculty, as will be seen in the 
subsequent department appropriated to its elucidation, 
is a distinct power of the human soul of the first 
importance, as regulating its connection with the 
supreme Spirit who gave man existence, and of whom 
he is a dependent subject. But this high faculty 
employs, that is, the soul under its influence employs, 
the ordinary intellectual faculties, and not any peculiar 
ones with which it has been supposed to be endowed, 
in reaching after a true discernment of the nature of the 
act, design, or thought called in question. 

As an accomplished lawyer is of great service to the 
judge on the bench by the mass of sifted distinctions 
w T hich he has laid before him, so this faculty is of great 
service to the soul when its movements are subjected 
to the examination of what is commonly called con- 
science, in enabling that faculty to arrive at a true 
judgment. The judge will exercise his own discern- 
ment in the application of statute law to each par- 
ticular case, and the Normal faculty will apply its sense 
of right and wrong, that is, its constitutional law, more 
or less legible on the human heart, when summoned to 
act as a judge ; but the aid of distinction may be found 
as useful in the latter case as the aid of the lawyer in 
the former. 

With distinction are associated its necessary con- 
comitants — division and abstraction. When we have 
distinguished forms, colours, or ideas, we have already 
divided them from others from which they are seen to 
differ ; and when we have divided them they are 
mentally abstracted or drawn aside from one another. 
As application kept steadily in exercise assumes the 
form of attention, and closest attention results in 



44 Christian Psychology : 

penetration according to the power of the intellect, so 
distinction, following its natural development, neces- 
sarily assumes the forms of Division and Abstraction. 
It is of the first importance in mental analysis that the 
root-power be distinguished from the branches, and that 
each be made to assume its proper place. 



Distribution. 45 



CHAPTER V. 
4,— DISTRIBUTION. 

BRANCH FORMS'. 

APPROPRIATION CLASSIFICATION SYMMETRIZATION. 

Closely connected with the foregoing is the intellectual 
attribute which we designate 

Distribution. — There is a principle of order in the 
human soul which, properly developed, tends largely to 
the progress of knowledge and to the happiness of the 
race. Associated with this principle, as its offspring, 
is the idea that there is a place for everything, and 
that everything is best in its place. Closely examined, 
this principle is seen to be a keen perception of the 
relation which one thing bears to another, and its 
fitness or otherwise for the position in which it is 
placed. Man likes variety, but not disorder. In a 
normal state of mind he cannot bear disorder in house 
or workshop, in Church or State. He will restore 
order wherever necessary, both by a right arrangement 
of materials, and by reducing to system all operations. 
Disorder is a loss of time and power ; and who can 
estimate the value of both ? See the workman turning 
over . his box of tools twenty times a day for some 
instrument out of sight, instead of having a place for 
each where it could be seen and seized in a moment. 
See the accountant spending hours, when moments 
might suffice, in searching for an entrance which his 
want of system has misplaced. 



46 Christian Psychology : 

When the mind has discovered, amidst a variety of 
things intermingled, several having points of similarity 
in colour, form, or destination, it seeks to classify them. 
In this Distinction goes hand in hand with Distribution. 
The faculty of distinction no sooner divides and 
abstracts things that differ, than the faculty of distri- 
bution begins to classify, by bringing together things 
which have points of agreement. If we have a 
mixture of black and white beans before us, we not 
only distinguish but we mentally classify, and the 
desire is formed to place all of one colour by them- 
selves ; in doing which a pleasure is experienced, as 
complying with a principle of order deeply seated in 
our constitution. In like manner material, or form, or 
size, may constitute the ground of classification. A 
box may be placed before us with specimens of gold, 
silver, tin, and lead in the ore. We are interested in 
marking the distinctions, but we also desire to take 
them out and place all the specimens of each ore by 
themselves that we may see each kind to advantage, 
and estimate the relative value. The mind is some- 
times pleased with the sight of variety ; but when 
numerous articles of the same kind are intermingled 
with others the principle of order comes to the front, 
with the suggestion to place by themselves things that 
agree in quality or purpose. The draper will not leave 
his silks blended with his cottons, nor will the farmer 
leave his hoes and spades with his ploughs and 
harrows. Sometimes the idea of symmetry and of 
want may call this faculty into operation. The artist is 
engaged on a painting. He must distribute both his 
figures and his colours. Here there must be enlarge- 
ment, and there a diminution ; here some additional 



Distribution. 47 

touches to deepen the colour, and there a reduction to 
lessen too great prominence. The general will dis- 
tribute his forces on the field of battle, not by the 
colour of their facings or the number on their 
buttons, or the size or nationality of his men, but by 
the necessities of his position of offence or defence. 
"Where there is weakness in position he will gather 
strength and raise defences ; where few men are needed 
few will be appropriated. The idea of local want, in 
order to completeness in efficiency, regulates his distri- 
bution. Thus, also, men in former days stuffed their 
garments to give their figure a desirable fulness ; and 
men and women now cover their heads with borrowed 
hair to supply a real or imaginary want. In such cases 
the ideal has taken the place of the actual. Men do 
not see at all times the objects of dissimilarity or the 
objects which display a want of symmetry before them 
to elicit abstraction and classification, but the mind 
supplies the defect. The full symmetrical outline is 
imagined, and to meet this standard of order and 
beauty distribution must be made. 

Take some common illustrations. See the disorder 
that reigns for a time at the busy saw mill when the 
men are few. Boards and planks of all lengths and 
thicknesses are launched out as they came from the 
saw. They lie in a straggling and unshapely heap. 
This is not what the orderly sawyer desired. The fit 
day is chosen, and order reigns again around the mill. 
All the planks and boards are neatly piled in the order 
of their respective lengths and thicknesses, and also 
with due regard to their kind and quality. When the 
purchaser arrives he may see in a glance whether he 
can be supplied or not. The time of neither buyer nor 



48 Christian Psychology : 

seller is wasted in searching for an article which is 
already exposed to view. Or passing by shape and 
size and having respect to quality or kind, visit the sea 
shore when the fishermen have drawn their seine to the 
shore, after enclosing a variety of fishes. The Gospel 
parable receives its literal fulfilment, for the good of 
different kinds, without respect to bulk or weight, are 
placed by themselves as a treasure, while the worthless, 
however large or attractive in appearance, are cast 
aside as of no account. Or take an illustration in respect 
to destination. You enter a general post office at a time 
when a large foreign mail has arrived. Bags are 
opened ; the stamping is indiscriminate ; after which, 
the classification begins. With the utmost alertness 
the eye seizes the point of destination in town or 
country, and the distribution is as prompt as the 
distinction. For fifty different inland offices, packages 
are made up with a facility and despatch known only 
to the expert distributor. 

In science, the classification is sometimes made on 
the possession in common of some particular organ, or 
the form which the organ may assume. The general 
form, size, structure, and utility are then disregarded. 
For example, the conchologist divides his shells into 
univalves, bivalves, &c, without respect to size or orna- 
ment. And the botanist, taking the flower as his ground 
of distribution, may bind in one class the rose, the 
strawberry, the apple, the cherry, and the almond. See 
the facilities for examination and use afforded in a 
museum by a proper classification of articles ; in a legal 
office, by the due filing of papers; and in a printing 
office, by a correct distribution of type. In the region of 
thought this faculty exercises a most beneficial influence 



Distribution. 49 

in co-operation with*distinction, on which it waits, 
when ideas and illustrations are made to assume 
their proper place, and order and lucidity charac- 
terise the writing or the speaking as the natural out- 
flow of the mental arrangement. The historian gathers 
his materials, arranges his divisions, selects his pro- 
minent points in civil or ecclesiastical affairs, and 
then distributes to each point the facts and figures, 
the persons and parties best fitted to bring out in 
vivid illustration the transactions of the period. With 
what elaborate art must this faculty have been exer- 
cised by the historian Gibbon during the eleven years 
(A.D. 1776-1787), in which the Decline and Fall of the 
Roman Empire was passing through his brain. Bridg- 
ing the chasm between the old world and the new, 
connecting the ancient with the modern over an expanse 
of thirteen centuries, many great and momentous 
events are distributed and decorated with a master's 
hand. Personages rise in their places to attract and 
arrest, as well as to instruct ; and ornamentation is 
applied to set off the individual with unwonted luxu- 
riance. While the faculty which precedes, and that 
which follows Distribution are ever in employment, 
especially Construction, the admirable exercise of this 
faculty, with the ample stores of facts and language 
always at hand, has enabled Gibbon to present a history 
not surpassed for attractiveness in the whole range of 
literature. 

The public orator divides his subject, distinguishing 
the main ideas involved in it. He then appropriates or 
distributes to the introduction something easy and 
pleasant, to gain the attention and remove prejudice. 
His strong points are exhibited in all their native 



50 Christian Psychology : 

power, purposely disdaining to gfre them any coloring, 
but taking care that they shall be seen from all sides ; 
but around his weak points he distributes all his 
supports, reiterating his assertions to carry the mind by 
storm ; and for his conclusion he reserves a strong force 
of arguments, illustrations, and exhortations, which, 
coming in rapid succession, clothed in bold language, 
and enforced by powerful gesticulation, are expected to 
carry conviction to every breast. Who can master 
the ideas so forcibly set forth by Demosthenes, the 
renouned orator of Greece, without feeling the glow of 
admiration for the skill displayed by him in the arrange- 
ment of materials. In all his great public orations, the 
art of the distributor is strikingly displayed. Having 
selected his point of attack, this intellectual champion, 
like an accomplished artillery officer, arranges his argu- 
ments like batteries for a concentrated fire on the object 
to be demolished, and, passing from one to another, 
pours in from every quarter a resistless storm of heavy 
words, till at last, gathering up all arguments, by the 
nearest approach to a simultaneous discharge from all 
sides, he seeks, by one grand effort, to leave no remnant 
of opposition visible. When we reflect on the over- 
whelming force of his oratory, we cease to wonder that 
Aischines, against whom the most elaborate oration 
was pronounced, fled from Athens and never ventured 
to return. 

In the faithful pastor we see the distributor of the 
bread of life. With a heart quickened by the divine 
Spirit, a mind stored with sacred truth, and the tongue 
of the learned, he knows how to speak a wcrd in 
season. Before him are various states of mind, but 
for each there is a portion. The ignorant require 



Distribution. 5 1 

instruction, the tempted need warning ; the slothful, a 
stimulus to action ; the desponding, encouragement ; 
the weak, strength ; the slumbering, something power- 
fully startling ; the diligent, approbation ; and the 
anxious, wise counsel. In the hands of a competent 
expounder, the inspired oracles, adapted to all con- 
ditions, afford the amplest materials for instruction to 
all classes. 

In Appropriation, the mind perceives the relation or 
claim of a certain object or idea to a certain place, and 
proceeds to locate it there. In Classification, several 
objects are seen to bear points of similarity in shape, 
colour, material, or quality, and they are brought 
together in distinct classes in the mind, according as 
they are found to possess the chosen point or badge 
of resemblance, previous to, and independent of, the 
actual or possible manual distribution. And in Sym- 
metrization, the mind has formed an ideal of perfection 
of form or beaut)-, and perceiving the deficiencies in the 
actual, as compared with the ideal, proceeds to distri- 
bute from its storehouse until every want is supplied, 
and the perfection of beauty elicits its admiration. 



52 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER VI. 
5.— CONSTRUCTION. 

BRANCH FORMS : 

ARCHITECTURE — COMPOSITION — IMAGINATION — 
SYLLOGIZATION. 

A very slight reflection is sufficient to satisfy even the 
ordinary mind that the spirit of man is universally 
endowed with the intellectual power of Construction. 
He can put together ideas or thoughts on any subject 
that may engage his attention ; he can build up forms or 
figures of real or supposed utility or beauty, and he can 
link together the intellectual frame-work of architectural 
structures, before a stone or a beam has been placed one 
upon another. The external exponent of this internal 
work is what naturally engages general attention. Men 
listen to the words of conversation without troubling 
themselves on the process of thought from which it has 
sprung ; they fasten their eyes on a statue or picture 
without asking by what means the mental model was 
fashioned ; and they admire the ornate structure without 
going beyond the mechanical art of the builder. But it 
is right to reflect that the words which are so rapidly 
and wonderfully linked together by the organs of 
speech, are but the exponents of ideas still more rapidly 
and wonderfully linked together by the soul : that the 
beautiful form that has sprung from the painter's brush 
had first its existence it may be in still higher beauty, in 



Construction. 53 

• 
the mind ; and that the lofty architectural structure, with 

all its ornaments, or with all its massiveness, was first 

erected in the wide world of man's intellectual domain. 

The tongue and the hand give external reality, to the 

best of their limited ability, to the ideal compositions 

and constructions of the internal world. 

This faculty is not only important but indispensable 
to man in his present vital connection with matter. It 
is called into requisition from the beginning till the close 
of life, by the child striving to frame words to convey its 
wants to a parent's ear, and by the aged mortal slowly 
uttering his last requests, by the youthful defence under 
serious accusation, and by the elaborate reasoning of the 
matured intellect, by the effort to construct a house of 
blocks or of sand in childhood's early years, or by the 
slowly-measured movements of the octogenarian in the 
formation of his own coffin. Material construction 
exhibits its richest powers where civilization and refine- 
ment reach their highest point. The native Australian 
in his barbarism will display no art in the construction 
of his gunyah ; and the Maori will be contented with an 
indifferent whare, as the Micmac is with his bark 
wigwam ; but the mart of commerce and the seat of 
refinement will reveal what the cultivated intellect and 
ample resources can produce ; while the taste of the 
nobleman and the wealth and ambition of the sovereign 
elicit the higher displaysof this faculty in the stately 
mansion and the magnificent palace. 

The ancient world has left us material monuments of 
this constructive power. The ruins of Greece and Italy, 
the buried palaces of Assyria, above all the stupendous 
pyramids of Egypt, testify to the energy and skill of the 
human intellect in material structures. But we need 



54 Christian Psychology : 

not go beyond our own generation. See to what per- 
fection machinery has been carried in all the general 
industries of life. Railroads and canals keep pace with 
civilization. Steamships cross every ocean — their mar- 
vellous machinery proving the constructive power of 
man. Sometimes an extraordinary effort calls forth the 
admiration of the world. It may be a timepiece of so 
extensive and complicated a nature that men may well 
marvel at the display of mechanical genius ; or it may 
be the building of some monster ironclad, destined, so 
far as human intention can go, to bear down the largest 
ship afloat, or of some Great Eastern, with which the 
name of the illustrious Brunei must ever be associated, 
devoted to the unique task of uniting the continents of 
earth by what may be designated the speaking cable. 

On this faculty the architect and the artist lean as on 
a right arm. The Maori will exhibit the plan of his 
pah, the Polynesian chief the picture of his intended 
war canoe, the educated and accomplished architect his 
cottage or palatial residence, his workshop or his ware- 
house, his college or his lighthouse; while the naval 
expert will exhibit the draught of his clipper yacht, or of 
the three-decked floating palace of an inland sea. The 
artist sits before his easel with palette in hand, and 
calling into play this noble faculty, there appears at his 
command the smiling countenance or the look of despair, 
the marriage group or the funeral procession, the lonely 
traveller or the crowded dwelling, the embowered cottage 
or the rugged mountain top, the silvery stream mean- 
dering through gardens or the tempest-tossed ocean. 
Not the natural only, but the unnatural also spring from 
his pencil or his brush. He can call forth the smile or 
the hearty laugh from the uncouth or the grotesque. 



Construction. 5 5 

He can convey an idea of keenest point by a peculiar 
and speaking representation, or he can teach a lesson of 
highest morality or of noblest ambition by the simplest 
creation of his constructive art. How powerful and 
important the art of picture-making. Pictures teach. 
Their lessons are almost indelible on the tablets of the 
soul. They can ennoble, and they may degrade. They 
live in the memory when the artist is forgotten, and they 
continue to teach when the subject which they adorned 
has passed into oblivion. 

By the aid of this faculty the whole race of deceivers 
ply their trade. If it be the forgery of a promissory 
note, or the grand mining scheme of swindling specula- 
tors ; if it be the snaring of an owl or the capture of an 
imperial army, the constructive power is alike called into 
requisition. By it villains of every class are enabled 
for a time to elude the vigorous pursuit and the strong 
arm of justice. But the same ingenious faculty can put 
together the dismembered particles of evidence, until he 
who runs can read, as in bold type, the name of the 
secret transgressor. 

In the domain of literature, this faculty has left monu- 
ments more enduring than brass. By it the simplest 
sentence and the most profound reasoning, are spread 
out to the sight or the hearing. To it the world is 
indebted for the plainest historical narrative, and for the 
grandest allegorical poem. It has left enduring displays 
of its power in Homer's Iliad, Milton's Paradise Lost, 
Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, and hundreds of other 
works of less extensive fame, but of equal utility. Shake- 
speare called it into vigorous use with surprising effects, 
aided, as it was, with uncommon penetration and prac- 
tical sagacity. In Sir Walter Scott it held high 



56 Christian Psychology : 

prominence, and was subjected to incessant exercise in 
the production of poetry and novels. His vivid descrip- 
tions mark an acquired aptitude in literary construction. 
What appears on the page is but the transcript of the 
vision of the brain, and that vision the construction of 
this high intellectual power availing itself of the stores of 
information gathered from every quarter. In his wake 
follow the hundreds of novelists of the present day. More 
than any other author of modern days, he nourished, if he 
did not in many places create, the taste for the reading of 
tales. To many, novels are the chief intellectual food. 
If of the highest quality, and sparingly used, the effect 
might be beneficial. But the low and degrading charac- 
ter of many, and the utterly useless material of most, has 
an enfeebling and pernicious effect on society which will 
not vanish with the present generation. In the con- 
struction of all this class of works, this faculty assumes 
the form of imagination. This term is in common use, 
and conveys the idea of power to construct images from 
materials of recognised utility and truth. So limited, its 
operation may be highly useful. But too often the 
images are not true, though drawn from matters of fact, 
for the construction is defective. But this noble faculty 
is degraded and prostituted when materials having no 
real existence in nature, in fact, or in history, are strung 
together in a manner to deceive the judgment and 
inflame the emotions to deeds of crime or pollution. We 
will not bind the mind down to tread forever the path 
of those who have gone before, to repeat only the facts 
of past history, to strike out no new path, to originate 
nothing. But we would have the nimble steed to be 
furnished with strong reins, and the explorer to keep a 
sharp eye when on untrodden paths. By this faculty we 



Construction, 57 

can bridge in a few seconds the ocean, and construct 
a ladder to the moon ; we can build a tower so high that 
we can overlook the sun ; or we can mount an airy 
chariot of our own fashioning, and ride round the great 
belts of Saturn. But what avails these castles in the 
air, these idle reveries ? They may set the mind free for 
a moment from its sordid cares, and teach us that 
although now confined to a material framework, we are 
endowed with a spirit to whom space is of small account 
when present restraints are removed. 

In mental, as in physical warfare, construction occu- 
pies a conspicuous place. The form of the rifle, the 
cannon or the battery, is of the first importance. In the 
construction of each, this power is exercised. So, in the 
formation of a sentence, the construction of a syllogism 
or the extended display of many separate arguments, this 
faculty is indispensable. Here the connection between 
Psychology and Logic is apparent. In the ordinary syl- 
logism, we have Distinction, Distribution, Construction, 
and Deduction at work. Distinction furnishes a selection 
of terms, Distribution arranges the particulars which 
belong to these terms, Construction unites these propo- 
sitions in their proper order; and Deduction, our next 
intellectual power, draws the conclusion. As the eyes, 
hands, and feet often co-operate in one work, as in the 
turning lathe, the sewing machine, and the loom, so 
different intellectual faculties constantly co-operate and 
manifestly in the ordinary course of reasoning. The 
incessant changes arising from this co-operation occasion 
a prime difficulty in mapping out the mental powers. 



58 Christian Psychology 



CHAPTER VII. 
6. —DEDUCTION. 

BRANCH FORMS : 
SAGACITY RATIOCINATION. 

Pursuing the chosen order of exercise, we now reach the 
Intellectual power, which we designate 

Deduction. — We occasionally hear a remark passed 
concerning a particular man, that "he is a man of good 
common sense " ; of another, that " he is a man of 
great practical sagacity " ; and of a third, that " he is 
a man of clear and sound judgment." These different 
expressions point alike to the possession of a deductive 
faculty, a power, in addition to, and in advance of simple 
Apprehension. What is common sense ? — It is, in 
ordinary language, the prompt discernment of what is 
fitting, proper, or becoming, amid the ever-varying 
circumstances of life. And what is practical sagacity ? 
— It is the keen deduction of the issues resulting from 
any cause or causes now in operation, or supposed to 
be in operation. And what is sound judgment ? — It is a 
deduction from an accurate apprehension of the relation 
which one thing bears to another. Thus, Solomon con- 
cluded, that is, deducted, that she was the true mother 
of the child who could not bear to see it cut in halves. 

When this power, called by some discernment, appre- 
hension, or intuition, is closely examined, it is found 
in each case to be a deductive faculty. There is an 
apprehension, intuition or discernment in the mental 



Deduction. 59 

process, but there is something more. Beyond appre- 
hension, in its most enlarged form of comprehension, 
there is a subsequent mental act, the drawing out of an 
additional truth from the truths or facts which have been 
compared. This truth now produced may be involved in 
the previous facts apprehended, as a part in the whole ; 
or it may be something totally different, a result of two 
co-operating agencies ; but in either case, the mental 
act of which this is the result, is properly designated a 
deduction, and not an intuition or direct apprehension. 
In common sense there is a swift collation of the act or 
word contemplated, with some rule, custom, or usage, 
followed by a prompt deduction that the word or act is 
proper or improper, becoming or unbecoming. Repetition 
or experience renders the decision, that is, the deduction, 
almost instantaneous. In practical sagacity there is a 
collation of knowledge or experience of past operations, 
both causes and effects, with the work in contemplation, 
when from a comparison of causes and circumstances an 
opinion is deduced according to the keenness of discern- 
ment or apprehension. In sound judgment there is a 
deduction or drawing out of a particular object or person 
from a general mass to which it is seen to belong, and of 
which certain characteristics are affirmed. In Solomon's 
deduction above referred to, the process ran thus : All 
true mothers have a tender regard for their offspring, 
and cannot bear to see them wounded or slain ; this 
mother has a tender regard for this infant, and cannot 
bear to see it slain, but will rather relinquish all claim to 
it ; therefore she is a true mother, and in the circum- 
stances, having regard to the total want of feeling on the 
part of the other, she is the true mother of this child. 



60 Christian Psychology : 

The consideration of this faculty touches on several 
questions on which metaphysicians have been divided 
in opinion. They relate to intuition and the law of 
causation. We shall give our own deliberate judgment. 
What is an intuition ? — It is a direct apprehension of the 
mind, as" distinguished from a deduction. The mind 
instantly seizes the truth, without any intermediate 
process of reasoning, however swift or subtle. We think 
that Dr. McCosh, a distinguished metaphysician of the 
present day, in dealing with this subject, has not been 
sufficiently careful in the use of terms. He says (Div. 
Gov., p. 534, appendix, 4th ed.) : " Every faculty in its 
primitive exercise is intuitive, and every true original 
faculty furnishes cognitions which are intuitive." Is it 
so, that an act of attention or penetration, of classifi- 
cation or construction, be it ever so primitive, is an 
intuition ? This question carries its own answer. 
Apprehension, or if you will, intuition, accompanies each 
# of these acts, but is itself distinct -from them, as the eyes 
are distinct from the hands, with which they co-operate. 
Is there not such a power or faculty in the mind as 
judgment or deduction, that by which we draw a conclu- 
sion from given premises ? Is not such a faculty " in 
its primitive exercise " essentially deductive, and not 
intuitive ? Either there is no such original faculty as 
deduction, or it is only another name for direct appre- 
hension, or Dr. McCosh has confounded things that 
essentially differ. Adopt the opinion of McCosh, and you 
blend all the powers of the mind into one, and this one 
you call Intuition. If we wish to have any accuracy in 
terms, we cannot pass off as an intuition what is a 
deduction. It may be said that in drawing the 



Deduction. 6 1 

conclusion from the premises, there is simply a keen 
apprehension of the secreted existence of the conclusion 
in the premises, as a part in the whole. Admitting the 
clearest apprehension of the relation of the propositions, 
and also the full scope of the ideas involved in them, 
there is still the drawing out from the general truths, 
and the moulding into form of this particular truth or 
predicate. If there is to be any enumeration of mental 
faculties, we cannot ignore, with all the subtle distinctions 
that can be drawn, the broad line of demarkation 
between apprehension, simple, direct, intuitive, and 
deduction often an elaborately drawn out result of the 
protracted comparison of detached facts or ideas. 

We also differ from Sir W. Hamilton, McCosh, and 
others, in respect to causation. What is the law of 
causation ? — It is that principle, or the abiding convic- 
tion, that every effect must have a cause, and a cause 
adequate to the effect. Is this conviction acquired, or is 
it intuitive ? Does it grow with us, or is it, intuitively 
apprehended without experience ? McCosh holds dis- 
tinctly (Divine Gov., p. 540), that it is intuitive. Clearly, 
in this case, McCosh's intuition is the conviction of an 
experienced, if not a matured intellect. Our decided 
opinion is that the conviction or principle, so far as it is 
our own, is the result of knowledge and experience ; in 
other words, that it is acquired. We certainly are born 
without ideas. We have a variety of powers in the germ, 
which are developed as we grow older. At a period so 
early that we cannot trace their origin, two convictions 
spring up within us. These are, our personal existence 
and the existence of an external world. As our ac- 
quaintance with mind and matter increases, we observe 
that certain results are produced by the operation of 



62 Christian Psychology : 

certain causes on mind or matter. Extending our ob- 
servations, we perceive that dead matter is devoid of 
the power of moving itself — that when moved it is 
operated upon by some power from without. In our 
ignorance we might attribute the change to a. very 
inadequate cause. But experience is ever growing, and 
from an accumulation of facts we learn to demand a 
force proportioned to the change produced. With 
experience we expect to see the same result occur when 
the same causes are set in operation in precisely the 
same circumstances. In the same way we expect that 
every modification in the cause or operating force will 
have a corresponding modification in the result. An 
artillery officer has discovered by trial that a certain 
charge of gun-power will carry his ball to the fort which 
he is besieging ; he expects that as often as that charge 
is placed in his cannon the ball will reach the fort. But 
when he wishes to strike nearer or further off, he will 
take care to vary his charge, and also the position of the 
muzzle of his gun. The principle is the same in an 
operation by which a pane of glass is broken, and a city 
is laid in ruins ; by which a spadeful of earth is lifted, 
and a lofty railway embankment is constructed. We 
must have a cause, force, or power adequate to the 
effect produced, whatever that may be. When there is 
no previous knowledge or experience of the power or 
force in the cause, it is impossible to conceive what the 
result may be. The savage who has neither seen nor 
known what a rifle is, can form no conception of the 
result that will follow from pulling the trigger when the 
rifle is ready to be discharged. Let him see it discharged 
in this way, and he may expect a similar report by 
simply pulling the trigger when the rifle is unloaded. 



Deduction. 6$ 

Experience will correct his mistakes, and he will learn 
that every effect must have a suitable cause. Can we 
say that the connection of a uniform sequence after 
various satisfactory experiments, is an intuitive con- 
viction. To me it appears most evident that it is a 
deduction from past experience or observation, and falls 
directly under the operations of the faculty which we are 
now considering. If intuitive, we had no need of expe- 
rience. Intuition in causation belongs to the Omniscient. 
He alone knows, before experiment, the whole inherent 
force in any cause, and the whole powers of resistance 
in any object acted upon, and the ultimate sequence of 
any action. 

In tracing back from effects to causes we have what 
Kant calls a regressus ad infinitum. It is true in a 
certain sense. We do go back, step by step, till we 
reach the first great Cause of finite mind and matter. 
McCosh's reply (530) to Kant is — "When we have found 
a power in the Divine Being adequate to produce all the 
effects which we see in the universe, the regressus 
ceases." .... " We hold that the intuition goes 
back to a substance in which power resides, but that on 
reaching this point it is satisfied. " ....." When 
we at last reach a substance which bears no traces of 
being an effect, we may stop, for the mind is satisfied." 
If intuition, that is direct apprehension, is not exercised 
when we look for a return of the effect from a re- 
application of the cause, but rather the power of 
deduction acting on past knowledge, is it exercised when 
we are " going back to the substance in which power 
resides ? " We think not. There is indeed apprehension, 
but there is also application and distinction united to 
deduction, operating on all past knowledge or experience, 



64 Christian Psychology : 

to discover if each cause, as it comes up, is not itself an 
effect. When the mind gets back to a Being, "in whom 
power resides," is it satisfied ? We think not ; for 
another and higher Being may have given that residing 
power. Are we satisfied when the mind has " reached a 
substance which leave no traces of being an effect ? " 
No ; for the thought will occur that it only requires a 
higher power of penetration to discover these traces. 
Does the regressus cease when we have found a Being 
" adequate to produce all the effects which we see in the 
universe ? " No ; for we can conceive a creation or 
universe superior to the present, and requiring the 
exercise of higher powers than now possessed by the 
cause which produced these effects. Where then do 
we rest ? Where Kant said, though in a different sense 
of the terms, "ad Infinitum." We reach the Infinite 
One. We cannot go behind Him. He is Self-existent. 
When we reach the self-existent, and as a consequence 
the eternal, the unchangeable, and the omnipotent, we 
do rest ; for we have reached the end, or rather the 
Beginning. Beyond Him no flight of soul can carry us 
— wherever we rest He is — and therefore we cease and 
are satisfied, because we deduce the conclusion that 
when we have reached the infinitely perfect and good 
we neither can nor need go further. It may not be 
unnecessary to add that, while differing from McCosh 
and Hamilton in their wide application of intuition, we 
are supported in our views on the point in hand by such 
men of great intellectual power as Sir John Herschel, 
Dr. Thomas Brown, John Stuart Mill, and others. 

In the everyday movements of life deduction is in 
constant exercise. When the subjects are familiar, the 
decision is swift, as if by intuition ; when they are 



Deduction. 65 

strange and intricate, a just inference is the result of 
patient and undisturbed investigation. But in Mathe- 
matics and Logic this faculty has a peculiar field. 
With angles and sides given, the mathematician is ever 
deducing equalities or differences. He proceeds on 
certain axioms. Are these axioms directly apprehended 
as true ? We are not prepared to say that they are all 
so apprehended at first sight. The truth of some of 
them at least is not seen by all minds until the test of 
experience is applied. To minds familiar with the study, 
their truth is apparent at first sight. With accepted 
data the progress of deduction accords with the sim- 
plicity or complexity of the problem. The logician only 
asks an array of facts. He will throw them into form, 
and present you with the conclusion. He will appre- 
hend the meaning of terms ; distinguish those that 
differ ; distribute each to its place ; construct his 
syllogism ; and finally he will, with ease or difficulty, 
according to the nature of the subject, in the exercise 
of this faculty, deduce the correct or natural inference. 
To the geometrician and arithmetician, deduction 
and construction are the right and left arms. They 
constantly co-operate. When construction has done 
its work the way is prepared for deduction, and when 
the latter has performed its requisite task the further 
work of construction may proceed, if the desired 
conclusion is not yet reached. Hence, in all great 
financial problems, the vigorous power of deduction is 
of the first importance. Without it extensive trade 
enterprises would speedily collapse, and the monetary 
transactions of an empire fall into inextricable con- 
fusion. By its steady exercise, guided by clear 
apprehension of the law and of the deed under 



66 Christian Psychology : 

examination, the judge is enabled, through much 
conflicting testimony, to draw the just inference and 
declare his judgment of the case submitted to his 
adjudication. The clear mental vision finally arrived 
at is not the intuition which some modern psychologists 
delight to harp upon, but the result of numerous threads 
of evidence all drawn separately out and fashioned into 
one whole deduction, which carries universal con- 
viction with it. Under its operation the supreme 
Judge, the Man Christ Jesus, will finally deliver the 
legitimate inference infallibly drawn from a comparison 
of human conduct with the law and light afforded to 
each for the regulation of life. Let us then live as 
those whose thoughts, words, and deeds are subject 
to an inferential deduction, from which there is no 
appeal. 



Inquisition. 67 



CHAPTER VIII. 
7.— INQUISITION. 

BRANCH FORMS : 
INTROSPECTION RETROSPECTION PROSPECTION. 

One of the most valuable powers possessed by the 
human intellect is that of self-inspection. The intel- 
ligent man knows that he has the power of reflection, 
that he can turn the eyes of his understanding upon 
himself, that he can explore his own thoughts, and 
search out some idea or vision of the past which he 
wishes to revive and examine. This power of sight and 
search we have chosen to designate Inquisition. If 
disposed to add to the swelling vocabulary of our 
language, we might have restored the old term 
Spectation, or framed from the Greek the equally 
expressive word Theoretion. But it is better to employ 
a common term in a new way, and all the more as that 
term gives prominence to the important idea of search, 
which is something beyond sight. 

Inquisition embraces Introspection, Retrospection, 
m\d Prospection. We can look within and examine the 
past and present, and prospect or search into the future. 
The first step in the inquiry into the operations and 
condition of the soul is a turning of the mental vision 
from the external world, with which it is so naturally in 
contact, upon the soul itself. The mind can look upon 
itself, and so become conscious of what is passing 



68 Christian Psychology : 

within it. A question may here arise : Is the mind 
always conscious of what is passing within it ? If by 
conscious we simply mean aware of or alive to impres- 
sions or feelings operating in the soul, we say this 
belongs to sentient, intelligent existence, and only ceases 
with non-existence. But if by conscious we are to 
understand a distinct knowledge of the particular 
thought or feeling moving in the soul, we say this is the 
result of introspection, a looking within on the operations 
of the soul, a simple inquisition. We cannot ignore the 
fact that the mind is receiving literally millions of 
impressions from without, of which it takes, at the 
time, no distinct notice so far as to inquire what they 
are, or why they come ; nor can we say that these 
so-called vague impressions are mere useless lumber in 
the recesses of the intellect. But it is better to confine 
the term conscious to a distinct perception of what is 
occupying the mind at any time, the thought or feeling 
with which it is engaged, and that perception or 
cognition, the result of introspection. 

The mind will bear to be looked at and examined. 
At first it is very intolerant of restraint, and shows great 
impatience and restlessness under examination. But 
if approached with gentleness and patience, as the 
tamer approaches the wild animal which he would 
subdue, it will by degrees suffer itself to be closely 
inspected, and finally to be minutely searched. It is* 
difficult to form a just estimate of this faculty. As the 
external organs of vision furnish the mind with a large 
measure of its knowledge of external nature, so this 
power furnishes to the mind a knowledge of its own 
thoughts, plans, desires, and habits. By it we read the 
condition and doings of the soul. We may mark the 



Inquisition. 69 

indulgence of a wrong train of thoughts, and check 
their further progress. We may see the rise of an 
improper feeling, such as envy, jealousy, anger, and 
before it can assume control, we can suppress it. We 
may discover the influence which a certain habit had 
begun to assume over our thoughts, and either take 
alarm from its evil nature, or feel encouraged from its 
elevating and ennobling effects. Especially are our 
plans and purposes the objects of scrutinizing attention. 
The origin and issue of such are inspected, that we do 
not wrong on the plea of a good motive, and that right 
be not done from a bad motive. " Know thyself," is a 
maxim of the first importance to a responsible being. 
To obey it, we must be endowed with the power of 
introspection, and exercise that power to the extent of 
close self-examination. Better it would be to be 
deprived of eyesight than to be devoid of this inner 
vision. This personal inquisition is generally aided by 
the exclusion of external sights and sounds. When the 
eyes are closed, in the silence of the night, or better 
still, the early dawn, the mind can survey its own 
domain, inspect its own apparatus, and explore its own 
treasures. Cooled and refreshed as if by the dews of 
the night, it will pass and repass over its own territory 
with brightened vision and sprightly vivacity. For 
this, however, it requires training. No tyro in mental 
•inquisition can rein in and guide this restless spirit. 

Mysterious being ! It knows no rest. In midnight 
hours, when profound slumber enfolds and fetters the 
body, it is active as a bird released from a cage, or an 
animal relieved from a burden. It takes the oppor- 
tunity to roam at random, construct the most surprising 
visions, and perform the most difficult operations. 



JO Christian Psychology : 

But when the morning comes it can examine the doings 
of the night, and read its joys and fears from the 
impressions of those dark and silent hours. To dreams 
in general we attach no importance ; they are but the 
disordered remembrance of the past, or the broken 
anticipations of the future. But we should run counter 
to a very wide experience if we did not admit that at 
times certain events, with their circumstances, are 
presented, we say not from what sources, in the visions 
of the night to the mind of one who may be particularly 
interested in these events. The agitation has some- 
times been so great by these mental impressions that 
the slumber has been broken ; when the mind 
immediately calling into operation the faculty of 
inquisition, searched into every lineament of the dream 
and took notice of every circumstance for future use. 
Many such visions have been fulfilled to the very 
letter. 

In Retrospection this power is still more largely 
exercised. We are very frequently looking back on 
past impressions and ideas. Yet this looking back is 
all within the soul, and is simply an inquisition for 
something we want amid the stores of the mind. At 
this point we touch what has been called the association 
of ideas. It is apparent to all reflecting persons that 
ideas, facts, impressions are so associated in the mind, 
or so cohere to each other, that the calling up of 
one is the bringing up of others along with it, or the 
discovery of one is the sight of others beside it. Things 
naturally cohere which have been together in time and 
place. The mind abhors disorder, and it is disposed to 
group together ideas which have occurred together ; in 
other words, the impressions are stored away as they 



Inquisition. /I 

come, and as they are seen to refer to each other. 
Take the case of one hearing for the first time the 
strange notes of an unseen bird. When first heard, 
there is no conception of the form or colour of the bird 
present in the mind, but when once the bird has been 
seen, while giving utterance to these notes, there is 
associated with these peculiar sounds the conception of 
the figure and colour of the bird, so that whenever they 
are again heard, the conception or idea associated with 
them follows instantly. Or take the case of a national 
flag. When we know not the nation to which it belongs 
we may only think of its shape and colours ; but so 
soon as we know the nation of which it is the emblem, 
a new idea is associated with it, and the sight of the 
flag anywhere brings up with it the nation to which it 
belongs. Sometimes a long chain of incidents is linked 
with the explanatory idea. When the connected idea 
has been very faint from, it may be, a simple impres- 
sion, we may have some difficulty in discovering it. 
We see a stranger and are told his name. We have 
not looked on him very closely, nor have we repeated 
his name ; we meet the same face some weeks after, we 
know that we have seen him before, but are quite 
unable to recall his name, at least at once. But let us 
meet him several times and hear his name repeated 
while we are looking on him ; the person and the 
name become linked together ; in other words, with the 
impression of the man is associated an idea or name — 
they lie together in the mind ; the sight of the one is 
the sight of the other. 

In the arrangement of its stores the mind seeks some 
distinguishing mark as of time or place. The events of 
a year are often passed over, or overhauled, to use a 



72 Christian Psychology : 

sailor's phrase, and the idea of the year labelled to 
them. Hence, in making inquiry for a certain fact or 
event, you ask in what year it happened, and finding 
that you go with the precision of a druggist to his 
labelled boxes, to search among the events of that year, 
in the order of time as they occurred. In this inqui- 
sition you are greatly aided by the idea of place. 
With the name of a certain place in which you have 
resided for a longer or shorter period, many impressions 
are associated. Take the case of a man going round 
the world in one of our mail steamers. He may go 
east round to the west, or west round to the east ; and 
he may have in all a dozen of stopping places. With 
each of these are linked many ideas of persons, places, 
and scenes, so that the recalling or discovering of the 
name of the place will bring with it a train of impres- 
sions of sights and sounds. We see the same cohesion 
or concatenation in music or singing. A man who 
cannot read the notes of music may yet learn to sing 
with great accuracy by practising, after hearing others. 
The notes, long and short, high and low, become linked 
in a certain order, that the sounding of the one is 
followed naturally by the sound next in order. In this 
case there is little doubt but the nervous and muscular 
action of the voice has much to do with the regularity 
of repetition, as in the acquired facility in the use 
of the fingers in playing the piano. When words 
accompany the notes the association of ideas appears 
as in other cases. 

Again, we notice that an apprehended resemblance 
between an object now seen and one formed)' known 
brings out a chain of thoughts and impressions. The 
traveller remarks : That hill reminds me so much of 



Inquisition. 73 

such a place — and that lake or bay of such another. 
A person in the street remarks : That lady passing 
reminds me so much of one I met in such a place 
many years ago. How is this explained ? Where 
have these impressions been during the years that 
have rolled by ? And how are they now brought to 
light ? The explanation seems to be as follows : The 
mind is ever receiving the impressions, some of which 
are of figure and form, others of ideas or conceptions, 
which are treasured up naturally in the order of time. 
It is possible that no impression is ever lost which is 
received by a healtrry or ordinary mind, at least while 
the texture of the brain is undisturbed. These impres- 
sions may be afterwards re-arranged, and in a manner 
labelled, by certain distinguishing marks. Every 
repeated presentation to the mind, or as often as it is 
seen or looked at by it, the impression is deepened, and 
the mind becomes familiar with it. When a new or 
strange impression reaches the mind, it is viewed by it 
in contact with its past stores, as if with the question, 
What is this ? or, To what does this belong ? when 
its identity, or similarity, or points of dissimilarity, 
with some past impression or idea may soon be 
distinguished, and the man may be heard saying, I saw 
this before — I saw a person very like that man yester- 
day — or how changed from what he once was, how 
worn, and haggard, and grey, after those years of 
absence in a foreign land. When the new object has 
been subjected to this inquisitorial faculty, and the 
stores of the past have been ransacked for something 
at all resembling it, and in vain, the impression is 
declared to be novel, strange, mysterious, and the mind 
takes notice of it as such. Such would be the sight of 

E 



74 Christian Psychology : 

a foreigner some time ago in the interior of China, or 
the sight of a steamer in former years in the bay of 
some Polynesian isle. 

When a man resumes a subject of conversation or 
writing in which he has been interrupted, he looks back 
or within, that is, in ordinary language, he tries to recol- 
lect, the most recent conception or idea connected with 
that subject, and constructs a sentence that will pro- 
perly grow out of, or belong to, that last idea. When 
asked to recollect some fact of the past as occurring in a 
certain place, he calls this faculty of inquisition into 
vigorous use, and seeks for the impression or conception 
of the place in which it was said to occur, and then of 
the time, in the hope that with the conception of the 
place and such a time will be found each event that took 
place in the order of occurrence. The impressions have 
followed each other in order, the mind has stored them 
in that order ; many of them are transparencies — the 
sight of one is the sight of a group ; in a moment, a 
whole scene is the object of vision, as if a panorama had 
been rolled out, and all by the prying application of a 
term or name, which, as a spring, acting doubly, has 
rolled up the present and rolled out the past. 

The power of retrospection, commonly called memory, 
is often referred to by materialists in proof of their 
theory. But the argument is far from conclusive in 
:;heir favour. If mind is refined matter, mind must 
change with the change of matter. Physiology informs 
us that the material of the human body is ever being 
renewed while life lasts ; and it is asserted that once in 
seven years the whole has been changed. If matter is 
so renewed, and mind is matter, this mind must be 
so renewed. But we find that the memory of the events 



Inquisition. 75 

of childhood remain with old men, proving that the 
person has continued the same, whatever changes have 
passed over the body. As the body is ever undergoing 
change, and the mind remains substantially the same, 
the body and the mind must be radically distinct, and 
therefore the mind cannot be matter such as the tissue 
of the body is. It may be said that the mind, if matter, 
could be so renewed piece-meal as not to disturb its 
identity over the lapse of years. Our reply is, that it is 
incomprehensible that the innumerable impressions of 
events and attendant circumstances, could be renewed 
on the material of the brain without the renewal of the 
sensations and reflections which first produced them. 
As a matter of fact, we know that scars remain only 
from deep material wounds ; all the lighter bruises, 
erasures or cuts disappear in a short time. But appa- 
rently a more formidable argument is brought forward 
when it is asserted that an injury to the body affecting 
the brain, destroys the memory. We at once admit 
that persons suffering from ill-health are at times 
subject to a loss of memory. The loss may occur 
suddenly, by paralysis, or by exhaustion of the vital 
powers of the system. But what does this prove ? That 
mind is matter ? — By no means. But simply that mind, 
the human mind, can only operate in our present state 
of existence through matter — that is, brain matter — in a 
certain state of vitality. A larger degree of vitality is 
required for some mental operations than for others. 
Retrospection is one of these ; and with it we may add 
Application and Construction in their various degrees. 
We may sometimes use our hands, when we cannot 
walk ; so we may use some mental powers in a feeble 
way, when we cannot use others. Inquisition, in all its 



j6 Christian Psychology : 

branches, demands vigorous vitality. Those who have 
heavy mental work must take care that the brain is well 
nourished by suitable blood. 

The mind is often engaged in prospecting or fore- 
casting the future. The youth often indulges in bright 
anticipations of the future in store for him. The aged 
frequently cast their eyes back on the past, and sit 
musing on the glories that surround the setting sun ; but 
sometimes, looking beyond this earth, their vision is 
directed skyward, as knowing that their night is far 
spent, and the dawn of an eternal day is at hand. 
Prospection may be the offspring of hope or desire, but 
it may also be the result of a sense of duty, and in either 
case it is easily distinguishable from that which gives 
rise to it. In prospection or foresight the mind makes 
inquisition amid all its stores for what will cast light on 
the darkness of the future. When the future is that of 
place, inquisition is made for all information pertaining 
to that place; when it is that of condition, search is made 
for all causes operating towards the desired or feared 
result. The voyager looks forward from day to day to 
the place where he is to land. If he has been there 
before, his past conceptions of the place are reviewed, 
and he already brings before his mind the main features 
of the harbour, wharf, and city towards which he is 
moving. If he has friends there anxiously awaiting him, 
and to whom he is much attached, he will all the more 
frequently search the stored conceptions of the past, 
that he may already dwell in thought where he so much 
desires to be in bodily presence. If he has not been 
there before, he gathers up from all quarters what infor- 
mation he can concerning the place, searching the minds 
of others by his questions for the conceptions in which 



Inquisition. jj 

he finds himself defective, and from all he can learn, 
frames, by the faculty of construction, an idea or mental 
vision of the place with all its surroundings. Sometimes 
the prospect is gloomy in the extreme. A storm is 
moving up in front of us, and we are moving down to 
it. Resources are diminishing and dangers are increas- 
ing. The mind is searched for past experience to resist 
the approaching evil, or to meet it with firmness, when 
it cannot discover a way of escape. The statesman is 
much engaged in prospection. He will forecast the 
natural results of a diminishing revenue in a curtailment 
of expenditure or an increase of debt ; unless there has 
been a large excess in the past. Or he may calculate 
from a ratio of increase in resources how much he can 
safely expend throughout the year on works of public 
utility. Is not this a mere question in arithmetic ? — 
Not exactly. He has many probabilities and uncer- 
tainties to take into account ; and must trace from past 
experience of the operations of similar laws in similar 
circumstances the most probable results from the opera- 
tion of his proposed tariff. He makes his estimate, and 
is applauded or condemned, at the close of the finan- 
cial period, according as his power of inquisition, as 
foresight, has enabled him to see very accurately the 
future, or proved its defect in a lamentable short- 
coming. 

Happy is the man who, in the use of this faculty as a 
power of self-inspection, can see the lineaments of a 
renewed moral nature within him, and from the law of 
progress may see the perfection of the divine image, 
and his consequent admission into the select family of 
which the great God-man is the head — who, after a 
careful exploration of the road on which he has been 



7 8 Christian Psychology : 

journeying, may safely conclude that its termination is 
the heavenly Jerusalem — and who, in the natural decay 
of the physical frame which assures an early dissolu- 
tion, discovers in himself from the indwelling of the 
Holy Spirit the germ of immortality, and justly anti- 
cipates the development of that germ in a glorious 
eternity. 



Exhibition. 79 



CHAPTER IX. 
8.— EXHIBITION. 

BRANCH FORMS: 

PRESENTATION PARABOLIC AND SYMBOLIC 

REPRESENTATION. 

The human intellect possesses the important faculty of 
holding forth, presenting, and illustrating its conceptions, 
by means of language, direct and simple, by illustrations 
or material pictures, and by symbols. To this power 
we give the name of 

Exhibition. — It might appear to some that in this 
action the mind is exercising no particular faculty, but 
simply the general power of communication with the 
external world by material organs, or that, if any power 
is exercised, it is only that of construction, which has 
already been considered. On closer reflection, it will 
be seen that the mind can not only invest an idea in 
plain language ; it can also adorn and illustrate it, as if 
holding it out in a picture ; it can go still further off, 
and select symbols as exponents or exhibitions which 
have no formal resemblance to the objects which they 
represent ; and it can employ what has been constructed 
and arranged in holding it forth to the admiration or 
detestation of men, and in pressing it upon their atten- 
tion. We have placed this power thus far in the rear, 
because by it the highest conceptions of the soul are 
displayed ; it employs all the preceding attributes, and 



So Christian Psychology : 

is, in a manner, the mouth or tongue of the soul. By it 
the loftiest adorations and supplications are laid before 
the throne of the Eternal, and by it, alas ! the lowest 
scurrilities and vilest blasphemies exhibit the depths of 
corruption into which the human spirit can fall. Con- 
struction is its favourite assistant, but may not be 
confounded with it. To the power that can hold out a 
conception, turn it over and over that it may be seen in 
every light ; bring all the light of heaven and earth to 
illuminate it ; place side by side objects of comparison ; 
spread it out to its utmost bounds ; adorn it with all 
conceivable attractions, and press its reception with all 
the persuasive force of the soul, we must assign a place 
distinct from the faculty of construction, even in its 
most complicated form. 

The mind seeks to convey its thoughts and feelings 
by sounds. Many of the inferior animals express their 
instincts and feelings in a similar way. But man shows 
his superiority by framing a language which may be 
constantly used as the exponent of his conceptions. 
Words or sounds are exponents of distinct ideas. Modi- 
fications of these sounds are modifications of the ideas. 
The combination of the one is the combination of the 
other. Sounds are also heard expressive of joy, as 
laughter ; and of pain or sorrow, as wailing or moaning. 
Lower animals have also their groaning under pain, and 
their muttering under pleasure. Man advances a step 
when he frames a written language, using signs as 
exponents of sounds. Sounds, though often powerful 
and full of thought, are transitory and fleeting ; signs, 
with all their modifications and combinations, are per- 
manent or enduring. 

When the mind, in exhibiting a thought or expressing 



Exhibition. 81 

a sentiment, has failed in producing the impression 
desired, it has recourse to other terms, and if they fail 
to be apprehended by the hearer, the conception or 
idea is reconstructed, or the subject presented from 
another aspect, and suitable terms adopted for the new 
conception. When the conception is unusual, and 
the terms of the language defective or scanty, the mind 
may burst beyond the limits of ordinary use, and coin 
new terms, or endeavour to supplement by gestures the 
defect of sounds. 

If the idea is not sufficiently presented by the use of 
plain direct terms, illustrations are called in to aid the 
exhibition. And in this the speaker borrows from 
objects of nature with which he is most familiar. The 
hunter will speak of one as swift as a moose, as slippery 
as an eel, as shy as a weasel, or as savage as a wolf. 
When the North American Indian would illustrate the 
grasping covetousness of the pale-faced European, under 
the guise of friendship, he said: "When the pale- 
faced stranger came, he saw Indian seated on a log, 
and came to him and said, ' Brother Indian, let me sit 
beside you.' The Indian moved over, and gave him a 
seat. After a little, he again said, ' Brother Indian, 
move over a little more.' The Indian gave him more 
room. The request was soon repeated, until at last the 
Indian had no room to sit upon the log, having moved 
from one end to the other. Not satisfied, the pale-faced 
insisted on giving up the whole log, which the Indian 
refusing to do, the fight began." The Almighty, in 
communicating his thoughts to his creatures, often 
adopted the same method. He sent Jeremiah to the 
house of a potter that he might see him at work, and 
when there he told him that with the same ease as the 



82 Christian Psychology : 

potter made or unmade an earthen vessel, so could He 
make or unmake any kingdom or nation. And when 
he would give the same prophet a clear conception of 
the two classes existing at the time in the nation of 
Israel, he set before him two baskets of figs — the one 
the very best, the other the very worst — the latter only 
fit to be thrown away. 

Another mode of exhibition is the parabolic. This is 
not a simple illustration of a detached truth, but a 
continuous narrative of what is true in nature, and may 
have occurred in fact ; and designed to convey a lesson 
which would be less forcibly expressed in plain and 
direct language. The parable of the ewe lamb, as used 
by Nathan against David, exhibited more keenly the 
greed and unfeeling cruelty of the king than any plain 
terms. Under cover of the narrative he was able also 
to finish without violent interruption, as might have 
been the case had he proceeded to charge the king 
directly with the crimes. Our Saviour adopted a 
similar method with much of his teaching. Attention 
was secured by a simple narrative ; the impression 
produced had a connected and permanent character — 
the lesson would either be gathered at the close or 
remain for future study ; and the incidents of the 
narrative, as often as they occurred in actual life before 
the hearer, would attach themselves to or call up the 
lessons associated at first with them. It furnished 
truths with hooks like seeds, that they might stick 
wherever they touched, and morals with pictures that 
might be photographed upon the soul. 

In advance of the parabolic is the symbolic. In 
prophecy this form of exhibition holds a high place. In 
the visions of Ezekiel, Daniel, and John, the Divine 



Exhibition. 83 

Being presents the most prominent events in symbols. 
Ezekiel saw a vision of wheels within wheels moving 
rapidly, but under complete control, illustrating the 
providences of God which are complicated, rapid, but 
under perfect control. Daniel saw wild beasts as the 
winged leopard of the West, representing the swiftness 
and ferocity of the Macedonian conqueror. John, among 
many symbols, saw two women, one clothed with the 
sun and having the moon under her feet, representing 
the true Church, the other arrayed in purple and scarlet, 
and seated upon a scarlet-coloured beast, and with a 
golden cup in her hand, representing, as all who have 
eyes may see, the false and apostate Church which has 
had its seat in Rome. Man readily takes up this mode 
of communicating ideas. Among all nations, from the 
rudest to the most civilized, symbols of authority or 
subjection, of office or rank, of sale or compact, have 
been in use from the earliest times. In this faculty may 
we see the origin of the hieroglyphic writings. 

To the public speaker exhibition is of the first 
importance, and ought to be cultivated with great 
assiduity. The orator, the statesman, the lawyer, and 
the preacher depend largely upon their power of 
presenting, clothing, illustrating, and urging their 
conceptions or convictions. They distinguish and 
distribute, construct and deduce ; but yet they must hold 
forth, adorn, and press their sentiments. See the 
specimens of oratory which have come down to us from 
ancient times. In some the power lies in the arguments ; 
in others in the illustrations ; and in others in the 
vehement persuasions. In the best there is a blending 
of the three, expressed in the choicest language. The 
good is painted in its brightest colours, the evil in its 



84 CJiristiau Psychology : 

worst. What is fitted to move the passions, as stimu- 
lating to action, is seized with energy, and plied with 
ardour. Modern orators copy the natural and the 
logical. Some excel in declamation, others in invective; 
some in pictorial illustration, others in pathos ; some in 
richness of diction, others in force of reasoning. Each 
has his own style, his own peculiarity, and natural 
spring of power. Speech has vast influence, but few 
public speakers take pains to make themselves effective. 
The statesman trusts to his facts and figures, the lawyer 
to his distinctions and legal knowledge, and the preacher 
to his general acquaintance with doctrine and the 
critical knowledge of the text in question. This common 
defect demands a remedy. 

It is in adoration and prayer that this faculty is 
called to display its noblest efforts. The endeavour 
to comprehend that wondrous Being whom man would 
adore, his position of authority, the splendour of His 
throne and attendants, and the perfection and glory of 
his character tends to enlarge the mind to its utmost 
capacity, and furnishes the materials for the loftiest 
conceptions of praise. Then is heard from the elevated 
spirit of man, the outburst, " Hallelujah ! the Lord God 
omnipotent reigneth ! Salvation and glory, and honour 
and power, and might and dominion be to Him who sits 
upon the throne/ 1 When the highest thoughts have been 
expressed the soul is conscious of its inability to com- 
prehend the Self-existent ; and bending low as it 
approaches the Omnipresent can only exclaim, with 
covered face, " Holy, holy, holy, Eternal Jehovah, 
incomprehensible One, from thee I am, by thee I live, to 
thee I come — before thee I bow — thine I am, and shall 
be for ever." And where shall pleadings be heard, and 



Exhibition. 85 

the soul exhibit all its depths of feeling" if not at the 
throne of mercy, when unending wrath is deprecated 
and unending glory sought. There, in truth, the great 
battle of life is fought and won ; the conqueror receiving 
a diadem outweighing in value all the crowns ever worn 
on mortal brows. 



86 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER X. 
9.— RETENTION, 

BRANCH FORMS : 

CAPACITY — GRASP. 

We close the survey of the intellectual department of 
the human spirit by assigning the last place to the 
faculty of 

Retention. — The mind possesses in an enlarged form 
the power of retention. It is endowed with an indefinite 
capacity for information and thought. Who can fathom 
all its depths, or search into its hidden caverns, or 
ransack all its secreted stores of past experience or 
acquired information ? We cannot say that a solitary 
thought, or the most evanescent vision with which it 
has had even a casual connection, has totally and abso- 
lutely parted company with it for ever. The good that 
may be lost for ever can be remembered still ; and the 
evil from which we have been mercifully saved, can or 
may be remembered for ever. In the one case, the 
retrospection will only add to the misery, while in the 
other it will add to the felicity. 

We have used the term capacity at the head of this 
Department as possessed of an active signification, as 
involving the idea of capability, and not mere passive 
reception to which Sir W. Hamilton would arbitrarily 
restrict it. The mind has what appears to be a vast 
passive receptivity ; but being instinct with life, it exer- 



Retention. 87 

rises the power of grasping, moulding, exhibiting, and 
retaining what comes within its reach. It is not a dead 
hollow, into which you may pour what streams you 
like, and from which you may dip at your pleasure. It 
may refuse to receive, and very certainly it often 
refuses to let go. It has the power of Retention, as 
well as of Apprehension. The unity of the spirit 
involves the blending and co-operation of its powers in 
a greater or less degree, according to the demand made 
upon its resources. Hence it may be often very difficult 
sharply to define the limits of nearly related powers. 
The colours of the rainbow blend into each other. Man 
cannot say that his vision is sufficiently sharp to detect 
the very last line of the one colour, and the very first of 
the other. And it may be impossible for any human 
intellect so keenly to distinguish the movements of the 
mind, as to say, " This is the last movement of one 
power, and this the first movement of another." Facul- 
ties may rise into action almost simultaneously. Reten- 
tion is seldom alone. Application and spectation are 
its common attendants. When controversy arises, and 
the man must hold fast in resistance to opposition, 
Distinction is often called into exercise to justify the 
refusal of concession demanded. The mind naturally 
applies itself to that which it will retain. And it as 
naturally keeps looking at what it is afraid of losing. 
Yet both application and spectation are easily dis- 
tinguishable from retention. We may apply our minds 
to an object, and yet consent to let it go ; we may yield 
the point in dispute while perfectly conscious of what 
we are doing. And we may look at a subject, and 
instead of desiring to retain it, we may order its instant 
removal. 



88 Christian Psychology : 

This power may be seen in operation in the very 
noblest and in the very basest of characters. Our 
Saviour, when tempted by the adversary, held fast to 
his faith in God his Father, and to the principle of 
implicit obedience to His commands. And the adver- 
sary kept steadily in view his own design, the continued 
subjection of our race to his authority and influence, 
while ostensibly seeking to promote the comfort, honour, 
and public acceptance of the Saviour. And many of the 
followers of the Prince of light and the prince of dark- 
ness have shewn respectively similar displays of reten- 
tion in lofty firmness of purpose in the path of integrity 
and honour, or consummate duplicity in the crooked 
path of deceit and cunning. When we have the truth ; 
when we are in the right, the high command of heaven 
is " Hold fast ! " But too often, through the blindness 
of the understanding, we cleave to error and reject the 
truth ; and through the love of sin or gain, we continue 
the path of dishonour and of misery. • This is the per- 
version of a noble faculty to the loss and, it may be, 
the ruin of the man. 

Take some specimen illustrations from various depart- 
ments of human operations. The errand boy is sent 
forth with an express message, which he is charged to 
repeat word for word. By the way he may meet various 
attractions, such as boys at games, fruits in the stalls, 
pictures in shop windows ; but faithful to his trust, he 
keeps firm hold of the words of the message, strengthen- 
ing his grasp by frequent repetition. The injunction, 
11 Keep in mind what was told you," is obeyed by an 
actual holding in mind till the time of delivery. Or, see 
the same power at work in one of the highest grades of 
society. A skilled diplomatist is sent as an ambassador 



Retention. 89 

to a foreign Court, with special private instructions, in 
addition to his public and ostensible duty. He is 
charged to watch the movements and influence of 
another party at the same Court. Alive to his business, 
he watches while he does not seem to watch, and listens 
while he is apparently absorbed in something else. 
He makes errands on mere pretences, and affects 
indifference while keenly sensitive. All this while he 
keeps prominently before him the subject which most 
concerns his master, and searches into every cause 
that seems to bear upon it. Or see a case of 
long-studied crime. Belthasar Girard was hired to 
assassinate the Prince of Orange. For seven long years 
it remained the chief aim of his life. He watched and 
waited for the opportunity on which his heart was set. 
He first studied to disarm suspicion, then to prepare his 
instruments, then to secure a position, and lastly to 
provide for his escape. He is long in the receipt of 
favours from the hands of the very man whom he has 
vowed to kill ; yet he never seems to hesitate in his 
purpose, never to lose sight of his object for which, as 
a pretended persecuted Calvinist, he has come to the 
Court of the great and much-feared Protestant. He 
accomplished his object, but he perished most miserably, 
being unable to escape. 

Pertinacity often degenerates into obstinacy. The 
bulwarks raised for defence become enclosures, beyond 
which some defenders decline to look. When conscience 
has a share in the dispute concession is not easily 
obtained. In the early Church a keen contest arose 
about the retention or omission of one small letter of the 
Greek alphabet. The advocates of our Lord's divinity 
were not satisfied with the term 'opotovc-iov (liomoiousion) 



9<D Christian Psychology : 

"of like nature" with the Father, but insisted on 
'ofjioovaiov (homoousion) "of the same nature," as alone 
expressive of the scriptural doctrine. To the retention 
of the iota the one party bent their energies, while the 
others were immovably resolved on its exclusion. In 
such contests the Will comes prominently into view. 
It is in exercise in the steady use of all the intellectual 
faculties; but with Retention it is in close alliance. When 
the dispute loses much of its intellectual character and 
degenerates into obstinacy, this intellectual power gives 
place to the domineering Will. Thus Luther maintained 
his opinion on the phrase: "Hoc est meum corpus" by 
sheer strength of will, and not by intellectual power. 
He could not be said to reason fairly on the question ; 
but having taken hold of an idea he refused to let it go, 
however absurd it might appear. Thus, a great leader 
of opinion, a noble-hearted man, was left to himself to 
show how fallible are the ablest and best of human 
guides. 

Such is the varied and wonderful intellectual capacity 
of the human spirit, as it appears to our examination. 
Beginning with the simplest acquisition of knowledge, 
we have closed with the resolute retention of it. In all 
conscious operations, mental and physical, the will is 
present with more or less efficiency. Through it, as an 
executive agency, the spirit, this marvellous unity in 
diversity and complexity, employs and sustains the 
intellectual faculties in every voluntary exercise. 
Through all the diversity of powers, the unity is appa- 
rent. At one moment a single faculty may appear to be 
alone exercised ; in the next, two or three others are 
conjoined with it, modifying or controlling its influence ; 
after which, the whole soul may be found absorbed in 



Retention. 91 

one object ; then, again relaxing its grasp as if wearied 
by the effort, and falling back into a state of quiescence. 

We have seen Apprehension with its branches, 
simple Perception, elaborate Conception, and extended 
Comprehension ; Application and its branches, Attention 
and Penetration ; Distinction, with its forms of Division 
and Abstraction ; Distribution, with its branches, Ap- 
propriation, Classification, and Symmetrization ; Con- 
struction, in the forms of Architecture, Composition, 
Imagination, and Syllogization ; Deduction, in its 
branches of practical Sagacity and elaborate Ratiocina- 
tion ; Inquisition, in its wide range of vision, in its 
branch forms of Introspection, or Consciousness and 
Examination — Retrospection, commonly called Memory 
or Recollection, with Association of ideas, and Search 
— and Prospection ; Exhibition, in its forms of direct 
Presentation, Parabolic and Symbolic Representation ; 
and Retention, in its extensive Capacity and resolute 
Grasp. With these varied powers as organs the spirit 
touches, handles, separates, constructs, extracts, exhi- 
bits, hears, sees and holds. 

We have seen what may well engage our thoughts 
and elicit our admiration. Greater wonders lie before us. 



DEPARTMENT II. 



EMOTIONAL SUSCEPTIBILITY. 
CHAPTER XI. 

THE EMOTIONAL NATURE. 

Feeling is inseparable from life. The one is an accom- 
paniment of the other. Where there is no feeling, life is 
either partially suspended or totally extinct. It pervades 
every department of living existence, from the feeblest 
vegetable to the great spirit who fills immensity. 

What is life ? We have neither found, nor can frame, 
an adequate definition of it. But we may describe the 
essential manifestion of creature life. It is an organised 
material existence or endowed spirit, with the power of 
appropriating by feeling, instinct or intelligence, within 
the sphere of its location or motion, what is necessary to 
its existence, defence, development or perpetuation in 
entire subservience to the design of the Creator. It is an 
existence with power of individual development by its 
own action with the means placed within its reach by its 
author. The lowest form of life subject to our apprehen- 
sion is vegetable life ; the highest is pure spiritual 
intelligence of noblest attributes ? From the lowest to the 
highest sensibility, instinct, feeling, or emotion is plainly 
cognizable. We may therefore conclude that feeling, in 
some form, is co-extensive with life. In the vegetable, it 



The Emotional Nature. 93 

may appear in the sudden shrinking" from touch of the 
sensitive plant, or the quivering, colour-changing, and 
apparent bleeding of the wild swamp turnip under the 
knife ; while in the richly-endowed spirit it may assume 
the form of emotions of highest moral excellence, ex- 
hibiting the very bloom of existence in services the most 
gladdening to the performer, and the most acceptable to 
the receiver ; or it may well up and overflow in the 
outgoings of burning animosity or bitterest sorrow, 
displaying the extreme wretchedness of existence in 
violent collision with the salutary moral laws of the 
universe. 

Our business at present lies not with plant sensitive- 
ness, or animal instinct, but with the emotions of which 
the human spirit is the subject. But, as man has an 
animal as well as a spiritual existence, a body having 
wants and desires peculiar to itself, and a spirit totally 
distinct from that body in its necessities, emotions, and 
developments, it is neither possible nor proper in inves- 
tigating the latter, to overlook the influence and bearing 
of the former. Much has been and continues to be 
written on the mysterious connection of soul and body. 
Some of the latest speculations, as those of Professor 
Bain, would represent the two as a " double-faced 
unity." This comes in direct collision with the separate 
existence of the spirit as the conscious and responsible 
being, of which the body is at present the constant and 
necessary vehicle. The body is not the man ; nor is the 
spirit the complete human being. But the spirit is the 
man, the conscious intelligence, and its presence in the 
body is essential to the animal life of that body. It can 
and does live without the body, but the body cannot live 
without it. When physiological theories, founded on 



94 Christian Psychology: 

partial and obscure data, come into direct hostility with 
the experience of all ages, the testimony of scripture, 
and we will add the convictions of common sense, it is 
wisdom to call in question the proposed theory, and to 
regard the data as insufficient to bear the conclusion. It 
is not uncommon with such writers, Professor Bain 
included, to present bold speculations as undoubted 
truths, which, when examined, are found to rest on a 
very partial and defective experience. An atom of truth 
is seized and dwelt upon, and made the basis of a lofty 
superstructure, while a mass of matter beside it, that 
would lead to a very different conclusion, is overlooked. 

Man lives apart from his body. When the material 
frame is reduced to dust, he still lives — to think, to feel, 
and to act. While this doctrine is outside our present 
experience, it is too much to say that it is contrary to 
experience, or that it is beyond all experience. If spirits 
who have never been endowed with bodies exist, why may 
not human spirits exist with all the endowments of 
spiritual life when relieved of their bodies ? And if spirits 
foreign to the human race, have been known to enter 
bodies and control the action of those bodies, why may 
not spirits more congenial occupy and employ those 
bodies ? There is, therefore, nothing contrary to reason 
or analogy in the existence of human spirits, as intelligent 
and responsible beings, separate from the bodies in which 
they once dwelt. If we bow to the testimony of scripture, 
the case is settled. The great advocate of Christianity 
among the gentile nations, spoke of an absence from the 
body which would be a presence with his Lord ; and of a 
vision which he had in which he might have been in the 
body or out of the body. Theories which controvert the 
plainest teachings of the inspired word, must be false. 



7 lie E motional Na tu re. 95 

Nature never contradicts the voice of the Creator speak- 
ing in revelation. Man misreads the book of nature, or 
misunderstands the voice of inspiration. 

While maintaining the existence of the human spirit 
as a conscious and intelligent individuality separate from 
the human body, we are not slow to admit the closest 
vital union at present subsisting between them. They 
act and re-act upon each other. The body has life, 
animal life ; but the presence of the spirit is necessary to 
the maintenance of that life. The consideration of the 
material structure, organs, wants, sensations, or feelings 
of the body, belongs to physiology ; and while that 
science presses close upon the margin, it does not enter 
the domain of psychology. These are sister sciences. 
They should not be confounded, nor should they be 
separated. They should be studied in succession — first 
physiology, and then psychology. The study of the one 
to the exclusion of the other, can only result in one-sided 
conclusions. The perfect comprehension of either, we 
do not hesitate to affirm, transcends human capacity. 
An approximation to a satisfactory understanding of 
both, is all that can be made. In importance, beyond 
question, as bearing on a future and eternal existence, 
psychology excels physiology. But as the preservation 
and health of the body vitally affects the capacity and 
power of the spirit, a due attention is wisely bestowed 
upon it ; which attention is the result of some adequate 
knowledge of physiology however attained. 

To the animal life of the body belong certain sensations 
or feelings, pleasant or unpleasant, as of heat and cold ; 
certain tastes, agreeable or disagreeable, as sweet or 
bitter; certain appetites, as hunger and thirst, painful, 
but necessary to the preservation of life ; and the power- 



g6 Christian Psychology : 

ful social feeling designed for the continuance of the 
race. Through all these bodily feelings, the mind is 
often influenced to action ; sometimes it is violently 
agitated ; occasionally, the spirit is wholly absorbed by 
the pleasure or the pain, or the craving want produced 
by the- bodily sensation. On this interesting and attrac- 
tive border territory, we may not now enter, but the 
course of our survey of the emotional nature will con- 
stantly lead us to notice the uprising or subduing of 
emotion through bodily sensations or feelings, arising 
within or received from without. 

The spiritual life possesses a susceptibility of feeling 
or emotion of wide range and great power. It is seldom 
wholly at rest or entirely devoid of emotion in some 
form, either day or night. Even in sleep the soul is 
sometimes so agitated that words of anger are heard 
escaping from the lips, or the person awakes in a fright. 
How varied are these emotions ! At one time it is a 
gentle breeze imparting a fresh glow to all, and then it 
is a fierce tornado from which all escape as from 
impending ruin. At one time there is but a ripple on 
the surface with which an infant's hand may play, and 
then it is the wild agitation of the lake among the moun- 
tains, on which the tempest has come suddenly down, 
which tests to the utmost the skill of the voyager. One 
is hard to move, as it is to light wood saturated with 
salt water with a match ; another explodes like gun- 
powder the moment a spark reaches him. One is like 
some secluded land-locked bay seldom disturbed by 
storms ; another is like the New Zealand seas, seldom 
at rest from prevailing winds up and down the coasts. 
With one the emotion is noisy and fierce while it lasts, 
like a conflagration of shavings, but it is soon over; 



The Emotional Nature. 97 

with another it is like a coalpit on fire, which burns for 
years unseen, and whose existence is occasionally felt by 
a sudden explosion from no apparent cause, or by the 
unexpected subsiding of the earth, where you calculated 
upon a firm foundation. Sometimes it is highly bene- 
ficial, reviving the spirits and contributing to the 
restoration of health, as the effect of good news ; and 
again it is very injurious, depressing the spirits or 
animal vigour and impairing the health, as the effect 
of bad news. Within certain limits its influence is 
decidedly good, affording a needed stimulus ; beyond 
these it may be paralyzing, and in certain circumstances 
the shock may be so great, in other words, the emotion 
so powerful as to sever the connecting link between soul 
and body in instantaneous death. 

Emotions are produced both by external impressions 
and by internal reflections, or by a combination of both. 
You see a vivid flash of lightning and hear a loud peal of 
thunder, and involuntarily a slight fear possesses you ; 
you are a passenger on board a vessel on a dangerous 
coast, a storm has arisen, you heard with feelings of 
alarm the whistling winds and rushing waters, but a 
shock that has staggered you fills you with terror as you 
instantly realise that the vessel has struck on a rock. 
You meet a man that has done you some grievous injury 
in endeavouring to destroy your character, and you are 
filled with indignation ; or you meet a very dear friend, to 
whom, you are under special obligations, and the 
emotions of gratitude and joy combine to make the 
meeting to you most agreeable. You see a wretched 
drunkard lying in his stupor, and feelings of pity and of 
sorrow stir within you ; or the funeral of an only parent, 
attended by tender orphans, passes you, and you are 



g8 Christian Psychology : 

moved by sincere sympathy. In a crowd you may 
receive a box on the ear from some malicious one, which 
fills you with wrath ; in private you may receive a kiss 
from one very near and dear, which awakens the very 
different emotion of love. 

And when there is no disturbing sight or sound or 
touch from without, and the mind turns in upon itself, 
and looks back to examine past impressions and doings, 
you may readily detect the workings of emotion. You 
may see the man that has been apprehended for some 
crime, and placed in temporary ward before trial, 
agitated with fear from the accusations of conscience for 
the deed known to himself, and which he has reason to 
believe will soon be proved against him. If you have 
done wrong, you may, on reflection alone, feel the 
burning emotion of shame, which may be followed by 
sorrow, attended with the silent trickling down of tears. 
You may have observed a man sitting in silence, and a 
smile passes over his countenance, followed in a few 
moments by a burst of laughter. He has alighted on 
some happy moments of the past, and with the dis- 
covery he has revived their attendant emotions. You 
have done something which you know to be unquestion- 
ably superior to the performances of others ; reflecting 
on this, ere you are aware, that unprofitable and dan- 
gerous emotion of pride arises within you. You think 
on one occupying the place and receiving the attentions 
which you believe rightly belong to you, and that uncom- 
fortable feeling of jealousy begins to burn. Or you are 
suffering under severe affliction, grief has weighed you 
down, when, reflecting on the goodness and mercy of 
God and his gracious purposes towards all his people, 
that all things shall work together for their good, the 



The Emotional Nature. 99 

invigorating feeling of hope rises into power ; your soul 
is anew girded with strength, and the gloom of sorrow 
disappears. 

The emotions enter so largely into the activities of 
human life that a detailed and orderly treatment of them 
will be acceptable to general readers. They have been 
differently classified by metaphysicians. Dugald Steward, 
treating them as Affections, has divided them into 
Benevolent and Malevolent. Dr. McCosh, viewing them 
in connection with the Divine government, has arranged 
them in the following order : — 1. Instigative ; 2. 
Adhesive; 3. Remunerative; 4. Responsive to joy ; 5. 
Aesthetic admiration — with the opposites of each of the 
five classes. Others taking a wider range, have arranged 
them thus : — 1. Feelings of Liberty and Restraint; 2. 
Wonder; 3. Terror; 4. Tender affections ; 5. Emotions 
of self-complacency, Love of approbation, &c. ; 6. Sen- 
timent of Power ; 7. Irascibility; 8. Emotions of action, 
including the interest of Pursuit or Plot ; 9. Emotions 
of intellect, Love of Knowledge, Consistency, and Incon- 
sistency ; 10. Fine art emotions or Taste ; n. The 
Moral Sense (Cham. Encyclo., vol. 4). The first we 
must reject as clearly defective; the second, as vague 
and unsatisfactory ; the third, as confused, and devoid of 
all natural order. The very simple and natural arrange- 
ment which we would suggest and adopt, is that of: 
— 1. The Agreeable ; 2. The Disagreeable; and 3. The 
Indefinite Emotions. The first are attended with plea- 
sure, in a greater or less degree ; the second occasion 
pain or unhappiness in some measure, less or more ; the 
third may be attended with either pleasure or pain, or 
with neither in any marked or special manner. Under 
the first — the Agreeable Emotions — we would class 



ioo Christian Psychology : 

Gratitude, Hope, Love, Joy, and Pride. Under the 
second, or Disagreeable, we would place Shame, Hatred, 
Envy, Jealousy, Anger, Grief, Fear, and Depression. 
And under the third, or Indefinite, we would range 
Sympathy, Wonder, Zeal, and Desire. 



Gratitude. 101 



DIVISION I, 



AGREEABLE EMOTIONS. 
CHAPTER XII. 

I.— GRATITUDE. 

The term Gratitude is employed in our language to 
express both a passing emotion and a habit of mind. 
Thus, we may say with equal propriety, " The man, on 
receiving the gift, exhibited the most profound grati- 
tude " ; and, " The man was characterised by a frame of 
habitual gratitude for his many mercies." The temporary 
emotion of which we speak is the uprising of a warm 
feeling of kindness and obligation, or indebtedness 
towards an individual or body of persons from whom 
a person has received in act, or by report, some 
special favour or favours. The favour may assume 
almost every conceivable form. It may be the simple 
recognition by a look of kindness by a superior or a 
friend ; it may be the pronouncing of a word ; it may 
be the noble and manly defence of character in 
trying circumstances ; it may be the bestowment of 
relief when one was very destitute ; it may be a rescue 
from what would be a sudden and awful death ; and it 
may be the conferring of a gift which will enrich the 
soul to all eternity. In each case, the look, the word 
the act is regarded as properly a favour, that is, as 



102 Christian Psychology : 

something gratuitous or something exceeding in value 
or overlapping any word or act which may have called 
it forth. It is regarded as proceeding from kindness, 
and as such it evokes kindness. It is regarded as 
wholly or in part undeserved, arid therefore it evokes a 
feeling of obligation or indebtedness. Should the con- 
viction arise that the defence of character arose from 
selfish motives, and not from heartfelt sympathy ; or 
that the valuable gift now presented .was simply the 
payment of a debt long due, no gratitude swells the 
bosom. The payment of a debt may in some instances 
evoke a measure of gratitude. If the payment was made 
when it could not be recovered by law, being out of 
date ; if before the time specified by engagement, 
which might be regarded as something in addition to 
the actual debt ; if without solicitation, frankly, fully, 
and cheerfully, and at a time when a person was really 
in want of money ; or if when long considered as lost, 
and for years forgotten : in such circumstances a kindly 
feeling arises within the man covering the lower 
reaches of gratitude towards the honest and honourable 
debtor. The emotion is not confined to the actual 
reception of a favour ; it is awakened by the report of 
such a thing being intended, or of a kindly work per- 
formed at a distance. Nor is it restricted to the facts 
of a case. The report may be incorrect, yet believed to 
be true this proper feeling arises in the soul. The 
feeling may be often misdirected, the real benefactor 
being overlooked, and another receiving the thanks to 
which in truth he is not entitled. As a natural feeling, 
it is universally displayed by the young as well as the 
aged ; the sovereign, as well as the beggar ; the savage, 
as well as the civilized — a string of beads calling forth 



Gratitude. 103 

the same emotion from the one, that the public thanks 
of a great nation will do from the other. So becoming 
is this emotion considered by civilized society, that he 
who does not show it in proper circumstances, is 
stamped as guilty of a high social misdemeanor. Ingra- 
titude is indicative of something more than the mere 
absence of feeling ; it reveals a nature in which the 
nobler attributes of humanity have been repressed and 
the meaner developed ; it is a marked social and 
spiritual defect. 

If we inquire into the design of our Creator in implant- 
ing a susceptibility of this emotion in our nature, we may 
discover that it was intended in the first place to 
awaken towards Himself, as "the Father of lights, from 
whom cometh down every good and every perfect gift," 
a feeling of kindness and a sense of obligation which 
would lead to some sincere endeavours to make an 
appropriate return ; and in the second place, to produce 
a feeling of goodwill between man and man, and to 
establish a process of mutual assistance. It was of 
great importance to the happiness of the race that 
friendly feelings should exist among men, and that 
generous deeds should be acknowledged and rewarded 
in some way, not dependent on the material ability of 
the receiver of favours. Genuine favours proceed from 
kindly feeling. The receiver of the favours may be very 
poor, but he may, by sincere gratitude, return the very 
feelings which found exercise in generosity ; and this 
gratitude may be so appreciated that the giver finds 
himself more than repaid; for it is more blessed to give 
than to receive. Further, this emotion involves such a 
sense of obligation that nature often prompts a man to 
say, " I cannot forget your kindness ; I must do some- 



104 Christian Psychology : 

thing to repay your generosity : " and being sincere, he 
looks around him for what may be within his resources, 
or what may be attainable by art or effort or influence, 
and in due time makes a tangible return ; which mutual 
kindliness is highly serviceable to the interests of 
humanity. While it is improper in ordinary circum- 
stances to repress the outgoing of gratitude in word or 
deed, as tending to impair the power of this natural 
emotion, it is proper to check any extravagance in 
either, by directing attention to Him who is the foun- 
tain of all our mercies, and to whom the chief thanks 
are due. 

The inferior animals are sometimes the objects of 
similar feelings. We not only praise the watch-dog 
who has seized the midnight thief as he attempted 
to enter the house, and who, wounded and bleeding, 
retained his hold of the burglar till the inmates of the 
dwelling were aroused, but we are moved with feel- 
ings of glowing kindness towards him, which is the 
essence of gratitude. With still warmer feelings are we 
stirred when the faithful Newfoundlander has brought 
safely to shore the child who had fallen into a rapid 
stream, beyond all reach of human help. It is with no 
ordinary emotion that the rider claps the neck of his 
noble steed from which he has just dismounted, who 
seeing the danger of his rider, put forth, when requested, 
his utmost powers of swiftness, and bore his master in 
advance of murderous pursuers, for many miles, till he 
reached a place of safety. The extension of such 
feelings to the lower animals was doubtless designed to 
aid in the appreciation of such gifts to man, and in 
securing for them suitable treatment from their masters. 
And these animals, when kindly treated, have shown an 



Gratitude. 105 

approach to gratitude. Cool and dress the rankling 
wound of a suffering animal, and he will show that he 
has understood your kindness. Remove the oppressive 
yoke, and take off the heavy load long borne, and set 
food before the famishing animal, and expressive move- 
ments will prove the double satisfaction of your humane 
treatment. 

Illustrations of this powerful emotion abound among 
men. Let us select but two — the one in which God is 
the object of gratitude; the other in which man is the 
object ; in the one case the subject of the emotion 
being an individual, and in the other a nation. The first 
is the gratitude of David, the King of Israel, towards 
Jehovah, the Divine benefactor. Nathan, the prophet, 
had been sent by God with a special message to the 
king. That message not only recounted past gracious 
dealings of God in behalf of David, but, referring to the 
future, promised the establishment of his throne and 
kingdom for ever in the persons of his descendants. 
David was deeply moved by the whole message, and 
retiring to his place of devotion, he poured forth the 
breathings of a grateful heart in the following living 
words: — " Who am I, O Lord God ? and what is my 
house, that thou hast brought me hitherto ? And this 
was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord God ; but 
thou hast also spoken of thy servant's house for a great 
while to come. And is this the manner of man, O Lord 
God ? And what can David say more unto thee ? for 
thou, Lord God, knowest thy servant." At a loss how 
to express his thanks, he begins to extol and praise, as 
follows : — " Wherefore thou art great, O Lord God, for 
there is none like thee, neither is there any God beside 
thee." (II. Sam., vii., 18-29.) 

The second is the gratitude of the British nation to 
their late renowned and victorious general the Duke 
G 



io6 • Christian Psychology : 

of Wellington. At the beginning of the present century, 
Britain was hard pressed by her foes. Her great rival 
France aspired to be mistress of the world. The sons 
of Britain were fired, as in former generations, to do 
noble deeds on sea and land. Warriors were not want- 
ing, and God raised up many great men to command 
her armies and her navies. Among all the land war- 
riors of the time Wellington stands pre-eminent, and the 
nation was not slow in recognising his great services. 
His victories in India, at the outset of his career, 
brought him a knighthood and the thanks of king and 
parliament. For his services at Copenhagen, in A.D. 
1807, the House of Commons passed a vote of thanks. 
The Commons again thanked him for a signal victory in 
Portugal in 1808. Then followed severe encounters and 
several hard battles, in which Wellington displayed 
great skill which the nation acknowledged by the 
thanks of parliament, the title Viscount Wellington, 
and a pension of ^"2000. In due time the French were 
driven from Spain, the dukedom was bestowed, and a 
further grant of ^"400,000 from a grateful Government. 
Nor was it money thrown away. Had the French 
been able to secure the great resources of Spain and 
Portugal on their side, it is not difficult to see that 
Britain must eventually succumb under the exhausting 
draft on her men and means. On Wellington's arrival 
home, he received for the twelfth time the thanks of 
parliament, and was welcomed with greatest enthusiasm. 
The crowning victory of Waterloo had still to come. 
For this statues were raised in his honor, a mansion 
erected, and an estate purchased for him, and a further 
present of ^"200,000. These were the expressions of 
Britain's gratitude to her most illustrious military 
chieftain. 



Hope. 1 07 



CHAPTER XIII. 



■HOPE 



The human soul, in a healthy state, has a large measure 
of elasticity. When suddenly confronted with dangers, 
or subjected to severe pain, or burdened with an 
unlooked-for load, it rises to meet the pressure, and 
strives to sustain itself under the weight. This inward 
uprising is not of itself Hope, but is an essential element 
in it. A man led out to be shot by military execu- 
tion, may brace himself up to meet his doom by what 
appears to be stolid indifference, or pride, or by both in 
conjunction with other considerations, in none of which 
may hope find a place. But when in connection with 
this elastic, sustaining, uprising of soul, there is an 
impression, more or less strong, of coming relief from 
the danger, pain, or burden, the emotion of hope is 
found. Hope, then, is a compound feeling. It has two 
arms. With the one it upholds the soul under its trial ; 
with the other it grasps the impression or conviction of 
coming relief. It is generally regarded as the expecta- 
tion of, or looking for, some coming good. But it is far 
more than this. While looking for a future good, either 
by the passing away of present evil, or by the positive 
bringing of relief from an outward source, it sustains 
the soul with all its might, and merits the distinctive 
appellation of the sustaining emotion. 

Hope is the offspring of want, conjoined with the 
apprehension of possible desired relief. Hence, when 



108 Christian Psychology : 

there is absolutely no want, there can be no hope. If 
we can conceive a region of such felicity that every 
want is supplied, of such security that *no danger can 
be apprehended, and of such stability that no diminu- 
tion of enjoyment can ever happen, this benign helper 
will not fold a wing on that happy land. Such are the 
mansions of the glorified as revealed to us in the 
inspired pages. The domain of hope lies on this side 
that brilliant world. In like manner, where there is no 
apprehension of possible desired relief, there is no 
hope. There may be an apprehension of possible relief 
from acute suffering, for example, but no desire for it — 
medical aid is spurned, the sufferer desires to die, hope 
is not suffered to plant a foot within the limits of earth, 
although want is felt, and possible relief apprehended. 
Again we readily grasp an apprehension of desired 
relief conjoined with the sad conviction that it is not 
possible. How often do we hear it remarked concern- 
ing a dying one, that all hope is abandoned. The relief is 
desired, but it is beyond the possibility of human skill. 
Could we conceive a world where wants are many and 
pressing — where relief is apprehended in the abundant 
supplies of others differently situated, but where the 
conviction is irresistibly borne home that relief is not 
possible, there hope cannot cast the gleam of her benign 
countenance for a moment, and the absence of her 
sustaining arm is felt to the utmost extremity. Such a 
place is that benighted region, which is denuded for 
ever, by a just sentence, of the favour of the Almighty. 
Hope, then, belongs to an intermediate state. It is not 
required in perfect bliss; it can have no place in perfect 
misery. It is an emotion of the human soul called into 
exercise by the necessities of its earthly existence. How 



Hope. 109 

long and how widely has its soothing and sustaining 
influence been felt ? Who can enumerate its efforts ? 
To detail them would be to write the whole mental 
history of our struggling race. By its aid, the farmer 
toils in cultivating the soil ; the miner digs into the 
bowels of the earth, in search of precious metal ; the 
fisherman tugs at the oar amidst the stormy waves of a 
rock-bound shore ; the soldier keeps his head erect, and 
struggles on in the fiercest contest on the field of battle ; 
the weary and belated traveller holds on his way, in 
search of food and shelter ; and the shipwrecked 
mariner clings day and night to the floating wreck till 
a friendly sail pass by. It proffers its tender consolations 
to the sons of affliction, when they are far removed 
from human aid. The Greenlander, separated from his 

home by a sudden movement of the ice over which he 
has been roaming, and overtaken by a violent snow- 
storm, is not abandoned. Hope visits him ; and as if 
by a magic hand, reveals to him a clear sky, the wind 
reversed driving him shorewards, and his dear home 
again within sight. The castaway, the sole survivor of 
a crew, is not forsaken because he is but one. Every- 
day hope bids imagination paint before his vision a ship 
bearing down upon his dismantled and helpless bark ; 
and though often sickened by deferred hope, the vision 
is at length realized, and he is saved. When the dis- 
obedient prophet found a sudden stop put to his intended 
voyage by his occupation of the cavity of a great sea 
monster, abandoned by man whose power to save 
proved fruitless, and apparently forsaken by God whose 
anger he had provoked, hope descended after him into 
the depths of the sea, and holding up his head, bade 
him look once more towards the mercy seat. And in 



no Christian Psychology : 

cases, alas ! too common, when the curtain of life is 
about to drop, and the scenes of earth for ever to dis- 
appear, the glare of Time's fascinations being removed 
by the approaching twilight, deeds of darkness and 
pollution rise up to view, followed by a train of appro- 
priate tormentors ; the soul of man sinks as if into a 
great fissure of the earth, and looking up it sees an 
inundation of divine wrath trembling on the very verge 
of the chasm ; with redoubled energy and speed, this 
timely helper rushes to the rescue, and strives with one 
hand to stay the descending flood, while with the other 
it points to a throne of grace where the darkest and 
vilest deeds are freely forgiven to the truly penitent. If 
successful, its mission is fulfilled, and the soul wings its 
flight beyond the realms of hope ; if unsuccessful, and 
the downward pressure defies its utmost efforts, it 
perishes with the sufferer. 

The sustaining power of hope, its right arm, is exer- 
cised according to circumstances. Where there is great 
suffering or want, its utmost strength may be tested ; 
where there is no suffering, and but little sense of want, 
the sustaining arm may be greatly relaxed. A man has 
had a limb crushed by machinery, at a considerable 
distance from surgical aid. Assistance is sent for with 
all despatch, but in the meantime he lies in great agony, 
supporting himself as best he can with the hope that 
when the crushed portion is removed, the pain will be 
lessened and his life may be spared. In this case the 
strength of the soul oscillates between soothing sug- 
gestions, fitted to uphold, and longing expectations 
grasping for relief. Or a woman has been left with a 
helpless family, while the husband and father has gone 
abroad in search of employment. The scanty store that 



Hope. 1 1 1 

remained when the husband left is soon exhausted, and 
now abject want oppresses. Letters are written to the 
absent one, and most eagerly are replies looked for. But 
they come not. Mail after mail arrives but no letter ; 
no remittance for the sorrow-stricken mother and her 
famishing little ones. Hope is now hard pressed. It 
cannot rest within the house, nor can it leave it ; it 
comes and goes incessantly, till mercy brings relief, or 
all perish together. 

Or take a case in which the right arm is relaxed, and 
the left is mainly exercised in direct expectation. A 
farmer, of ample means, has sown a great breadth of 
land with some special crop, for which he has convinced 
himself there will be a large demand. While this crop 
is growing he is in weekly, if not daily, expectation in 
regard to it. In the meantime, beyond the exercise of 
patience, he is suffering no want, for his wealth is great, 
and personally he is under no distress. It is true he 
has some sense of want, for he would like to add 
thousands to thousands ; but that desire cannot be 
supposed, in any ordinary circumstances, to demand 
the sustenance which would be claimed by pressing 
poverty. But it is to the needy, and not to the full, that 
hope reveals her graces. She passes by the doors of the 
wealthy to bestow her smiles on the poor. Benign 
hope ! Stainless daughter of Heaven ! how many 
weeping eyes of suffering humanity hast thou wiped 
dry ! how many drooping heads has thy strong arm 
upheld ! how many throbbing hearts has thy gentle hand 
stilled, while sweetest, softest consolations fell upon the 
ear of the bereaved and desolate ! 

Auspicious Hope ! in thy sweet garden grow 
Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every woe ; 



1 1 2 Christian Psychology : 

Won by their sweets, in Nature's languid hour, 

The way-worn pilgrim seeks the summer bower. 

There, as the wild bee murmurs on the wing, 

What peaceful dreams thy handmaid spirits bring ! 

What viewless forms the ^Eolian organ play, 

And sweep the furrowed lines of anxious thought away. 

Angel of life, thy glittering wings explore 

Earth's loneliest bounds, and Ocean's wildest shore. 

Lo ! to the wintry winds the pilot yields 

His bark, careering o'er unfa thorn ed fields 5 

Now on Atlantic waves he rides afar, 

Where Andes, giant of the western star, 

With meteor standard, to the winds unfurled, 

Looks from his throne of clouds o'er half the world. 

Hope ! When I mourn with sympathising mind 

The wrongs of fate, the woes of human kind, 

Thy blissful omens bid my spirit see 

The boundless fields of rapture yet to be ; 

I watch the wheels of Nature's mazy plan, 

And learn the future by the past of man. 

Campbell. 



Love. J i 



CHAPTER XIV. 



3.— LOVE. 

Of all the emotions of the human soul, none is entitled 
to occupy a higher place than Love. Its hlissful and 
beneficent nature has ever secured for it a prominent 
place. The man who is habitually swayed by it cannot 
be unhappy ; nor can he cease to contribute to the hap- 
piness of others. What is love ? It is the soul in a state 
of emotion, fastening with delight on some object in 
which it perceives some special excellence. Here, as 
ever, the intellectual power is the avenue to man's 
emotional nature. Something is perceived or imagined 
to possess some special good or excellence, and the soul 
fastens on it with delight. If nothing good or desirable 
is perceived or imagined, this emotion cannot be evoked. 
If what is witnessed or apprehended is vile or offensive, 
the soul loathes it ; and instead of fastening on it with 
delight, turns away from it with disgust. If the object 
is in reality worthless, it must assume some attractive 
part, and appear to the soul to possess some excellence 
before it can be loved. The excellence may be material 
or physical, or it may be moral, or a blending of both. 
When we look upon an object of surpassing physi- 
cal beauty, there is not only a feeling of delight 
awakened, but also a reluctance to part from it, a 
cleaving to it, a desire to be associated with it. This is 
love. W 7 hen we meet with a man of moral excellence, 



1 14 Christian Psychology : 

amiable, sincere, pure, disinterested, benevolent, we are 
pleasingly impressed with his character ; we are dis- 
posed to repose confidence in him ; his disposition, at 
once affectionate and noble, captivates us, and we part 
from him with expressions of regret, and with the 
sincere desire that we may very soon again enjoy his 
society. This also is love. It sometimes happens that 
physical and moral beauty meets in one person. Then 
the object is the loved of many. More frequently, how- 
ever, moral excellence is exhibited without the material 
attractions which have a charm for most, and physical 
beauty is unattended with those spiritual graces which 
are the ornaments of the human soul. Hence, what has 
attractions for one has none for another ; the man 
ardently loved by some is as ardently hated by others. 
The cast of countenance which awakens this pleasing 
emotion in one, produces no such feeling in another 
intimately associated with him ; and the moral features 
which make a man to be prized by one class of citizens, 
render him the object of intense dislike to another class. 
But wherever love exists it is the offspring of some good, 
real or supposed, and the fruit like the root, is good- 
ness, real or supposed, towards all who are the objects 
of it. 

Like all other emotions, love varies in duration and 
degree. It may spring up, grow, and perish in an hour; 
or, kindling in early life, it may continue for many years 
to diffuse its genial glow over all the anxieties of the 
domestic circle. It may be so feeble that the first 
breath of slander will extinguish it ; or so vigorous and 
vital that blasts of opposition only make it burn more 
powerfully, while it utterly defies all the waters of 
calumny to drown it. It has been distinguished by 



Love. 115 

terms descriptive of the subjects which cherish it, and 
of the objects on which it rests, as divine, human, 
conjugal, parental, filial — and as spiritual, carnal, 
patriotic, domestic, selfish. 

If love springs from the perception of some special 
excellence in an object, how can a man love his enemies 
in whom he sees so much that is utterly offensive and 
repugnant ? And how can the most holy God love a 
sinful world in which not one wholly righteous can be 
found ? Is not our definition of love incorrect ? May 
it not be a wellspring of kindness in the human soul 
which can pour forth its beneficent waters by a mere act 
of the will, irrespective altogether of the moral state or 
conduct of the recipient of our favours ? We say, No ! 
Love is one thing. Kindness is another. Love is almost 
invariably attended by kindness — it is generally an 
immediate fruit ; but kindness is distinguishable from 
love, and may spring from another root, such as 
pity. Our business at present is with the natural 
emotion of love, that joyous, quickening feeling 
which fastens our heart on an object and makes 
us cleave to it with fond regard, and not with the 
moral duties of scripture as connected with a certain 
heart exercise. But as the soul's path to immortality 
lies along the high-way of heaven-revealed morality, we 
must notice this apparent difficulty, Let it be remem- 
bered, at the outset, that we are not required to love, 
that is, as we now understand the term, to fasten with 
fond delight on any creature without regard to his moral 
state. We are not required to love a rational creature 
simply as a rational creature ; for example, a fallen 
spirit. There is an enemy which we cannot love, which 
we dare not love in any sense. There must be also a 



n6 Christian Psychology : 

wide distinction in our regard between the moral and the 

immoral. It cannot be supposed that our hearts should 

cleave equally to the vilest criminal and to the purest 

christian. We must distinguish not only in the degree, 

but also in the quality, of our regard between these two 

classes. The virtuous must never be confounded with 

the vicious, and the same regard extended to both. If 

we are, then, to love our enemies, that is if our hearts 

are to rest with delight on those who have done us the 

greatest injuries; it can only be, according to the nature 

given us by our Creator, by our completely hiding from 

view the evil deeds performed against us ; the malignant 

disposition displayed towards us, and by our steadily 

fixing our attention on some former good deeds of the 

present enemy, or on some redeeming feature of his 

character, or by persuading ourselves that it was wholly 
by mistake that he injured us, and going a step further, 

by assuring ourselves that despite all appearances, he 
bore us only good will ; in other, words, by stripping him 
wholly of the character of an enemy and by presenting him 
to our minds in the amiable character of a friend. To 
most intelligent minds this will appear at once an impossi- 
bility, and further, it may not be a proper thing to try to 
persuade ourselves that we see a saint in one who is 
notoriously a vile criminal. Could or should the holy 
Jesus press to his bosom the base traitor Judas as he 
did the beloved John ? No; his very soul abhorred the 
man. Hence, if our definition of the natural emotion 
is correct, the term " love," as used in certain commands 
of scripture, requires particular explanation to avoid 
gross misconceptions. But is it not said that God so 
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son ; 
and what excellence could he perceive in this fallen 



Love. 117 

world to call forth his love ? May not love spring up, 
at least in the divine mind, without the perception of 
any excellence, and even towards the positively sinful ? 
We answer these questions thus: There was nothing in 
this fallen world to call forth this love of which we 
speak ; nor in our opinion can this love, that is love 
properly so called, spring up in any mind without the 
perception of some excellence. It is certain that God 
distinguishes between the good and the bad, between 
the precious and the vile, in the outgoing of his regards. 
He says, " Jacob have I loved and Esau have I hated," 
— of one, " I have loved thee with an everlasting love," 
and of others, " I will show you no favour." The 
passage so often quoted regarding the love of the 
Father to the world may be understood in two ways. 
No one who understands the Scriptures will question 
the statement that the term " world " is often used in 
a restricted sense, meaning a portion of the world or its 
inhabitants. It was said, for example, that the whole 
world has gone after Christ, when we know that many 
of its inhabitants had never heard of him ; it was also 
written by an apostle that the whole world lieth in 
wickedness, whereas it is clear that the Christian portion 
of its inhabitants were not. If we limit the world loved 
by the Father to the elect portion of it, we have only to 
regard that portion as seen clothed in Immanuel's 
righteousness, and reflecting the divine image to under- 
stand' how their beauty would call forth the genuine 
love of the Father. Seen as restored and glorified they 
are loved, — the Divine Being enfolds them, delights in 
them, and rejoices over them — with a love not only the 
most refined and genuine, but with a power and excel- 
lence exceeding all creature conceptions. By the other 



Ii8 Christian Psychology : 

interpretation we take the term world to mean mankind 
in general, and we solve the difficulty by affixing the 
true meaning to the term, which has been translated 
"loved." Much misconception has arisen from using 
the term "love" to express various states of mind. 
The word "love" is made to express, in our language, 
what the Greeks conveyed by three distinct terms — 
^ocu>, QiXsu and uyonrolu, — meaning respectively, I am 
passionately fond of, — I have an affection for, — and I 
feel kindly towards. The first expresses strong attach- 
ment as between the sexes ; the second has a wider 
range, and means affection in general, as between rela- 
tives and friends ; the third has a still wider range, 
embracing simple regard or benevolence, the tenderest 
human affection, and the loftiest divine esteem between 
the persons of the Godhead. The first of these terms is 
not used in the New Testament — the other two fre- 
quently. The third is the term used in the passages 
— " Love your enemies," " God so loved the world." 
Taking, then, the term aycvrciu, as used in the oldest 
classical writers, and in a sense borne out by the same 
word in the Hebrew (agabli), as used to express the pro- 
fessed esteem or regard of the Jews for Ezekiel, we adopt 
as the true translation of the word in the above phrases, 
the meaning — "show kindness to," or "treat kindly;" 
thus : " show kindness to your enemies," " God so kindly 
treated the world." This interpretation detaches the 
feeling of kindness from the emotion of love, properly 
so called, as the result of the perception of some special 
excellence, and leaves it to be the product of a kindred 
emotion, compassion, or pity, arising from a perception 
of relationship, want, or distress. We may therefore 
dispense with the old division of divine love into the love 



Love. 1 19 

of benevolence and the love of complacency. The love of 
complacency is the true, genuine love ; for there is no 
love without complacency. The love of benevolence 
is simply benevolence ; and that benevolence is the pro- 
duct, it may be, of love itself, or of compassion, or of 
a high sense of honour and justice. 

An emotion so interesting, influential, and powerful, 
has ever been a fruitful field for poets and novelists of 
every grade, and in its higher developments has been 
a theme of admiration to theologians. A few brief 
illustrations in distinct manifestations will meet our 
present requirements. We treat not of love in the abstract, 
but of love as rising within and influencing the human 
soul. Hence of divine love we do not speak; that lofty 
subject would elevate and ennoble any spirit that could 
fairly enter upon its contemplation. We limit ourselves 
to the outgoings of the human soul in love to things 
earthly and heavenly. That love which has mainly and 
naturally exercised the hearts of the sons and daughters 
of Adam in all ages, and to which the term has been 
chiefly devoted, is the attachment of the sexes. Its 
importance can scarcely be over-estimated, as in it are 
centred the vital interests of the race and the domestic 
happiness of its countless families. In this case natural 
instinct gives immense power and permanence to the 
perception of any excellence in person, mind or dispo- 
sition. And beyond any intellectual apprehension of 
adaptation of mind or person, where the attachment is 
of the model type, the highest and purest mutual affec- 
tion, there is an indescribable something, a coalescing of 
spirit with spirit, the spiritual affinities of the one meeting 
their counterpart in the other, as if the blending of both 
were necessary to one perfect humanity. The emotion 



120 Christian Psychology : 

awakened by the meeting of such intelligences when 
neither reason nor conscience may repress is not merely 
powerful, it is absorbing at least for a time ; and when 
rightly regulated, and fed by the numberless acts of 
domestic kindness, will continue to glow till the lamp of 
life expires. Associated with this as pertaining to the 
domestic circle is parental, filial, and fraternal love. 

Beyond the limits of relationship is the love of friends. 
Friends of the same sex are often known to love more 
warmly than brothers, more fondly than sisters. Between 
some an ardent attachment is formed on the first 
acquaintance ; between others the most extended ac- 
quaintance leaves only a confirmed repugnance. History 
affords some beautiful illustrations of the strength of this 
emotional bond. The love of Jonathan and David will 
ever remain most memorable. But how much remains 
untold and unwritten, of what was done and endured on 
sea and land, in peace and war, in plenty and famine, by 
those united in the bonds of friendship's purest love. 

At times the human soul is deeply moved by an attach- 
ment to what is called its native land. Let that land be 
invaded by the foe and laid waste, a thrill of emotion 
passes over the man as if a near relation had been 
wounded and laid low by some ruffian. Various feelings 
contend within him; but among them love of country 
holds a high place. He will prove his love ; his means are 
freely offered in defence ; and he is prepared to risk his 
life on the field of battle for the safety of the land which 
he calls his own. Let him reflect. What is this land to 
him more than other lands ? They may be fairer, 
brighter, richer than this; why not rise and remove and 
leave to the foe what he claims? Nay; his feelings 
clothe the hills and the valleys, the rocks and the shores 



Love. 121 

of the land of his birth with animation, and he feels that 
to desert his country would be to desert his mother in the 
hour of need. Let ignoble spirits desert her, he will not. 
And when in times of peace a sense of duty or necessity 
may require him to remove his home to another, and it 
may be distant land, he takes his last glimpse of his 
native land with a feeling of sadness, as if parting from 
a friend near and dear to him. It is true that when 
sorrows and injustice have occasioned the removal, the 
attachment is greatly lessened ; but, surviving all 
injustice and cruelty, a tie binds the soul to that land, 
as distinguished from its temporary occupants, which 
binds it to no other spot on earth. 

But the highest exercise of this noblest emotion is 
what may be termed Christian love. Its subject is the 
genuine Christian, the truly regenerated man. Its object 
is the divine Being — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. It 
springs from an apprehension of the transcendent per- 
fections of God, and his marvellous works of grace. It 
overflows on the first realization of the divine love to the 
individual, and it is constantly fed by a consideration of 
numberless present mercies, and the anticipation of the 
greatest blessings in the future. We love him because 
he first loved us. This love is shed abroad or diffused 
over the soul by the Holy Ghost. While then it is the 
action of the human soul, it is the action of the soul in a 
regenerated and not in a fallen state. The searcher of 
hearts could say of some who professed to be the people 
of God, — " I know you that ye have not the love of God 
in you." If they were in spiritual darkness it could not 
be otherwise. If love springs from a perception of 
excellence, there can be love only where excellence has 
been perceived. But the unrenewed mind being in 

H 



122 Christian Psychology : 

darkness cannot perceive the divine excellence, therefore 
it cannot love God. We cannot love what we do not 
know. God only can reveal himself ; therefore all who 
are without his divine illumination remain in ignorance 
of him, and without love to him. To see him in his 
grace is to love him; to love him is to enjoy life; 
and to live in that love is to bask in the sunshine of 
immortality. 



Joy. 123 



CHAPTER XV. 



4.— JOY. 



This emotion is peculiarly the agreeable emotion. It is 
so simple and so readily understood that the attempt to 
define it is merely the substitution of terms of similar 
import. It is the soul pleasingly, delightsomely excited 
to a greater or less degree, and for a longer or shorter 
time. The Creator, the happiest of beings, has made 
his animate creation susceptible of happiness. The 
occupants of air, earth, and sea, in their frolicsome 
gambols, confirm this statement. To man has been 
given an emotional nature, so susceptible of what is 
agreeable that the joy that is brought to it or evoked within 
it is seized, deepened, diffused and prolonged. It can be 
even recalled again and again after the lapse of years, and 
spread anew its cheering and refreshing influence over the 
soul. All are not alike. Some are favoured by a tem- 
perament, an emotional nature, so buoyant, so joyous, 
that it casts a sunshine over the most sterile waste, and 
lights up every gloom. While others dwell so much in 
the shade that all nature wears a sombre hue, a smile 
comes only by constraint, and an outburst of joyous 
laughter is so rare as to be deemed a grave impropriety. 
The one is susceptible of the faintest gleam of delight ; 
the other can only be moved by the most powerful sun- 
beam. No age is exempt from the healthful influence of 
this feeling. The infant resting On his mother's lap 



1 24 Christian Psychology : 

rejoices in her love ; the old man stooping to the grave 
recalls with brightened visage and quickened pulse the 
joys of the past, or rejoices in the speedy prospect of an 
immortality of glory. The school boy finds his pleasure 
in his success over rivals, or more generally in the free 
exercise of his limbs in the play-grounds. The gay, in 
their prime of life, find in fashionable amusements their 
well-spring of pleasure ; the successful speculation makes 
the cup of the merchant overflow ; and the crowning 
victory at the hustings is the jubilation of the politician. 
It would be endless to enumerate all the occasions of 
joy. As creatures of sense we are delighted by whatever 
pleasingly impresses us from without. The hungry man, 
after long fasting, rejoices to sit down to some favourite 
dish ; its very odour delights him in anticipation. The 
lover of music is charmed by some exquisite melody. Its 
thrilling notes meet a vital response in his spirit. He 
is transported by its animating utterances, and feels as if 
he could never weary in listening to its marvellous com- 
binations of Nature's sweetest sounds. To some sensitive 
natures a work of great skill, or a picturesque scenery, 
brings not merely a pleasing feeling, but positive joy. 
Their rapture finds vent in exclamations of surprise and 
delight. With what joy will some listen to a marvellous 
tale. Even science can present in the solution of 
her difficult problems not simply absorbing interest, 
but exquisite pleasure. In the history of our fleeting 
generation each season brings its joys to many. Some 
rejoice in the blooming spring, others in the golden 
harvest ; some in the ripe stores of autumn, and others 
in the quiet rest of winter. To most a marriage day is 
one of supreme felicity. It is natural that it should be 
so. What joy fills the breasts of the little ones on the 



Joy. 125 

day when the father has returned home from a distant 
voyage ! And older hearts share in that joy. When the 
lost child has been found, when the tedious lawsuit has 
been won on which all the comforts of home depended, 
and when the deadly disease has been mastered which 
had fastened on an only son, the spirit rebounds from the 
pressure of anxiety under which it laboured into an 
ecstasy of joy. But a purer stream of joy flows from a 
higher source. If the beauties and melodies, the 
pleasures and gains of earth fill the soul with gladsome 
emotions, much more may the glory and riches of 
heaven fill it with rapture. This is a joy with which a 
stranger cannot intermeddle. The line of communication 
with heaven can be broken by no mortal hand. Spiritual 
joy flows from a sense of the divine favour. Let the 
Most High lift on man the light of his countenance, and 
the human soul is filled with bliss. In the language 
of the prophet, the ransomed of the Lord return to Zion, 
their heavenly city, with songs and everlasting joy upon 
their heads, because as the poet of Israel informs us, they 
walk in the light of his countenance. If ever joy is pure 
it is when it flows direct from the fountain head. 
Wherever the light of the divine favour rests, a com- 
munication is established for the time, between the human 
soul so favoured and the great and everlasting fountain 
of joy which enlivens and gladdens the universe, and 
the result is, nothing more can be desired, the soul is 
absolutely satisfied. 

External indications promptly follow the internal feel- 
ings. This joyful emotion is revealed by smiling, whist- 
ling, singing, laughing, clapping the hands, and dancing. 
Let pleasant thoughts pass through the mind of things 
past, present or future, and a smile plays round the eyes 



1 26 Christian Psychology : 

and lips ; and as the emotion swells it is diffused over 
the countenance, clothing it with brightness. The same 
may occur during the hours of sleep. The soul is occu- 
pied with visions of beauty or pleasure, and the hidden 
joy comes to the surface in the face. It may even burst 
in laughter. The errand boy in his leisure trip, and 
the cowherd in his evening stroll, vent their exuberant 
feelings in whistling. Even the mechanic enlivens the 
workshop when things are moving swimmingly along by 
warbling out some pleasant ditty. When the emotion is 
fuller and deeper, it finds expression in song. The 
housemaid, the solitary rider, the group of sailors on the 
lonely deep, and the social evening party, at once express 
and confirm their joyous animation by some familiar air 
or some fashionable song. Religion, too, as the foster- 
parent of all true happiness, appropriately seizes this 
animating exercise and expresses some of her noblest 
thoughts in sacred melodies. The Christian, moved by 
heavenly love and filled with holy joy, pours forth his 
admiration of divine truth, his gratitude for mercies, his 
supplications for grace, and his adorations of his glorious 
Redeemer and God in the sweetest music of the human 
voice. And if the ethereal bodies of the glorified are 
capable of vocal utterance — and why may they not ? — 
what must be the song that shall be the exponent of the 
joys of their triumph. Earth never heard such melody 
since the morning stars sang together and all the sons 
of God shouted for joy. 

A common expression of joy is laughter. This is a 
discharge of inarticulate sounds from the throat, preceded 
by a sudden action of the diaphragm and lungs, and 
attended by a quick movement of the muscles of the 
mouth and of the face generally. When the laughter is 



Joy. 127 

excessive, the action of the diaphragm is so violent that 
the person stoops and instinctively puts his hands to his 
sides to support himself; when he is, in common par- 
lance, splitting his sides with laughter ! In laughter 
there is generally something more than simple delight. 
An idea of something singular, odd, extravagant or 
grotesque is often hlended with the joy. When the 
Syrian couple were informed by the Almighty that, 
although so aged, the long-expected son should be born 
to them, their joy found expression in a burst of laughter, 
although the future mother naturally desired to conceal 
this outcome of the emotion. Hence the assumption of 
something unnatural or odd in voice, manner, or dress, 
by those who wish to produce a laugh. By means of 
the laugh a pleasing and, in a measure, beneficial excite- 
ment is diffused over the physical frame. This is 
probably its natural design. When the joy is combined 
with a high state of excitement it is often expressed by 
clapping the hands. In this manner an audience in a 
public assembly at times proclaims its delight with the 
remarks of the speaker. Thus, also, spectators manifest 
their joy at the successful termination of some grand 
exploit. But the most forcible exponent of joy is 
dancing. When men leap for joy they are almost frantic 
with delight. This is very rare. Children often leap 
and dance for joy. Fashionable dancing has more 
excitement than pure delight. It is not beneficial to 
health' or morals. Children may dance. It becomes 
them. Adults of sober thought will leave to voluptuaries 
and savages the exciting formalities of the public dance. 
The purest joy is tasted in the sanctuary, and not in the 
ball-room or theatre. 



Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XVI. 



PRIDE. 



This emotion properly occupies the confines of the 
agreeable. It is within the agreeable, for it is pleasing to 
human nature to think highly of itself. But it is so near 
to the disagreeable that the continual indulgence of it 
never fails to call up emotions the very reverse of 
pleasant. What is pride ? Pride, properly so called, is 
the inflation of the soul with undue self-esteem, and is 
generally attended with disregard for, or contempt of, 
others. In its simple and original form the emotion is 
the elation of the soul on the conception of some excel- 
lence, personal or relative, which feeling is naturally 
agreeable. But, like other emotions in process of develop- 
ment, it alters its character so materially that what was 
commendable becomes uncommendable ; and what was 
lawful becomes unlawful. In common language we hear 
it said of such a man, that the sect, the party, or the nation 
is proud of him. We cannot banish from our minds the 
impropriety of the use of a term that may convey to the 
mind of the hearers ideas the reverse of those intended. 
The term properly embodies the idea of something vain 
and arrogant, neither commendable nor moral. Whereas 
the speakers simply intend to say that they are joyfully 
elated by their connection with such a man. In this 
there is no feeling of arrogance, and no contempt for 
others. It is the emotion in its earlier and legitimate 



Pride. 1 29 

development. The soul may be elated without being 
inflated. How many of our errors are traceable to 
the improper use of language ! To elated properly 
belongs trie simple idea of elevation, while to inflated 
belongs the idea of vanity. It would be well, perhaps, if 
the term elated could take the place of proud in all cases 
where arrogance and contempt have no place. A mother 
may be elated by the accomplishments of her daughter, 
or a father by the attainments of his son, that is, elevated 
and gladdened in spirit, without either being in any sense 
haughty or filled with contempt or disregard for others. 
A man who has gained an important victory after a 
severe contest may be elated, while his experience and 
good sense keep him from being inflated. The scholar 
who is publicly declared the winner of a great prize 
cannot restrain a certain gladsome rising of spirit ; it 
would be a degradation of him to say that he was proud 
in the sense of supercilious, or moved with disregard for 
the unsuccessful competitors. When states or provinces 
have been engaged in friendly contests in the arts, it is 
no unusual thing for those belonging to the winning 
side to exclaim — We are proud of our country. The 
truth is, they are elated or raised in spirit, not merely 
gladdened ; but not necessarily either bombastic or 
contemptuous. It is well when we can limit offensive 
terms to offensive meanings ; as it is never desirable 
to make the same symbol express both what is com- 
mendable and what is contemptible. 

Leaving the lower development of this emotion, we 
advance into the region of pride, properly so-called ; 
we leave the elated and enter upon the inflated. Here 
reason loses proper restraint and the man becomes 
giddy, vain, and insolent. The emotion becomes the 



130 Christian Psychology : 

controlling power, instead of being what nature designs 
an emotion to be, an impelling power. It is interesting 
to notice how the ancients expressed this feeling. It is 
generally dressed in a garb descriptive of "me par- 
ticular or prominent manifestation. The oldest moral 
writings extant — those of the Shemitic family — express 
pride by such terms as gaah or gobah, both meaning 
loftiness or haughtiness — zadon, swelling, inflation, 
arrogance — and rahab, violence, insolence. The Greeks 
expressed the same by uperephania, showing over 
others, making one's self conspicuous — and by ubristes 
insolent bearing, violence, corresponding to the rahab 
of the Hebrews. The Latins used the terms superbia, 
meaning loftiness, haughtiness, as bearing one's self 
above others, and supercilium, literally the eyebrow, 
but meaning also stern arrogance, as if by knitting the 
eyebrows ; a disdainful supercilious feeling. Our own 
term pride is from the Anglo-Saxon, pryta, meaning 
ornament, as if the outward adornment was an index 
of the inward feeling of superiority. As this feeling 
generally attended the possession of a handsome per- 
sonal appearance, or special external adornment, the 
emotion laid claim to the term which generally displayed 
its presence and its power. It is natural to describe 
men by the dress which they habitually wear ; but it is 
necessary to distinguish between the man and his dress, 
as the dress must in course of time undergo a change, 
and the most disreputable may be found wearing the 
dress of the most respectable. This emotion, then, as 
apprehended in its matured development by all ages 
and races, embodies the feelings of superiority, haughti- 
ness, inflation, arrogance, and insolence. 

Accepting the definition of pride as the inflation of 



Pride. 1 3 1 

the soul with undue self-esteem, we may ask, for the 
sake of illustration, what occasions this undue self- 
esteem. Self-respect, self-love, or self-esteem is a 
proper feeling, and is very valuable as a principle of 
action ; but when either becomes undue it proves 
injurious. This undue self-esteem is occasioned by an 
extravagant or unwise conception of superiority. A 
conception of superiority may be perfectly legitimate ; 
it is of the undue or unwise that we now speak. Few 
things have more power to produce this extravagant 
conception of superiority than rank. Rank, that is 
high social position, is superiority. So far, the con- 
ception is just. But while there is superiority in some 
things, there is equality in many things common to 
humanity, and there may be inferiority in some things 
to some of inferior rank. Hence, if the things in 
which the man is on a level with other men are over- 
looked, and he suffers his mind to dwell only on those 
in which he is superior, the result will be undue self- 
esteem. Wealth is generally associated with rank. 
When united, the proofs of superiority over the masses 
of humanity, in possessions, houses, equipage, atten- 
dance, and enjoyments are so many and so manifest, 
that it is by an habitual and studied effort, approaching 
to a habit, that the mind is kept from that haughtiness 
which is characteristic of pride. This noblest triumph 
over self is attained by the habitual contemplation of 
personal infirmities, the many essentials held in common 
with all men, and the temporary nature of all these 
social distinctions so prized by many. Wealth some- 
times precedes rank, and when possessed by the 
uneducated is seldom unattended by insolent bearing. 
The man is not only elevated, he is inflated by an 



132 Christian Psychology: 

extravagant conceit of his own superiority. He will 
abuse his fellow men who are in his service as if they 
were inferior animals. Personal beauty commonly 
leads to undue self-esteem. Though generally exhibited 
by the weaker sex it is not confined to them. Men 
were proud of their personal attractions before Absalom, 
and women before Cleopatra. A secondary class of 
superior mental endowments conduces to the same 
feeling. The highest endowments are ever associated 
with humility. It is only an inferior grade of a higher 
order that produces or incites that undue self-esteem 
which results in haughtiness towards men of mean 
intellect, or contempt for them. 

When animated by this feeling people often make 
strange spectacles of themselves. They are what the 
Greeks called, the "tetuphomenoi " — the stupified; their 
heads filled with smoke or vanity, and so regulated that 
the emotion breaks out in attitude, looks, airs, speech, and 
manners. They stand back from those conceived to be 
their inferiors, and raising themselves to their full height, 
a fit exponent of the inflated mind, they will not deign to 
look towards the ground, or, it may be, to answer a civil 
question. Or they may so far notice the objects of con- 
tempt as to fix a look of scorn upon them as if they 
would say by their looks, " how can you presume to 
approach us ! " On such occasions the emotion of anger 
is frequently blended with that of pride, a feeling of indig- 
nation being evoked for some conceived insult. A lofty 
head does not always indicate a proud feeling. Some 
walk erect from choice and habit, and yet carry with them 
a very benign and gentle spirit. While others walk with 
bowed head both from hypocrisy and habit, and yet carry 
a most inflammable spirit, their pride being aroused on 



Pride. 133 

the slightest appearance of disregard for their presence. 
The tossing of the head and the look of disdain most 
surely betrays its parentage. In the one word, manners, 
pride exhibits itself as in a looking glass. The dress, 
the movements, the attitudes, the service, the formalities, 
the attendance, all bespeak the ruling passion. Rivals 
must not be allowed to outshine them in any external 
display. Money must be freely lavished in dresses, car- 
riages, furniture, and entertainments, Family pride does 
not speak in the muttering tones of a timorous servant, 
but in the commanding words of an absolute master. 
And should the rivals meet, and the well-fed feeling give 
the reins to the tongue, we may understand that the 
speech would not be the most complimentary. What 
fires of speech have raged from sparks dropped from the 
tongue of pride. Undue self-esteem has dropped a 
challenge ; an equally proud spirit has taken it up ; the 
contest extends to families ; it is assumed by parties ; it 
inflames cabinets, and is decided at length by hundreds 
of thousands of soldiers amidst the dust, smoke, fire, and 
carnage of the field of battle. In days of yore, eight 
hundred years before Christ, Amaziah, King of Judah, 
carried by storm the stronghold of Edom, and slaughtered 
his foes. Inflated by the conceit of his own ability, he 
challenged the King of Israel to fight. He got a morti- 
fying answer in the shape of a humiliating advice. His 
pride did not suffer him to pass over the insult; the result 
was a battle and his utter discomfiture ; Jerusalem was 
taken, its walls broken down, and the city pillaged. In 
our own day Louis Napoleon, Emperor of the French, 
conquered the Austrians, and drove them out of Lom- 
bardy, beginning in the old track of his uncle. There is 
more love to France than to Italy in all this. Having 



134 Christian Psychology : 

humbled Austria, he must bring Prussia to her knees, to 
make France, as of old, the head of the continent. Pride 
sends the challenge, proclaims war on the merest pre- 
text, and patriotism answers with ardour, by rushing her 
armies to meet the invading foe. Swift destruction 
treads on the heels of pride ; France is prostrate in the 
dust; her emperor a captive; her capital in the hands of 
her hated rival ; her territory lessened, and her trea- 
suries emptied. And how often without a rival has 
pride wrought the degradation, if not the destruction, of 
an individual ! The haughty autocrat of old Babylon 
descends from the most powerful throne on earth to feed 
with the beasts of the field, as a punishment for his pride. 
The powerful prime minister of the succeeding empire 
worries himself because a poor despised Jew will not join 
with others in ministering to his already inflated self- 
esteem. How sensitive must be that pride which 
demanded not the death of the offender only, but the 
death of the whole race to which he belonged, as the 
just expiation of the wound inflicted. But the Ruler of 
heaven and earth threw the weight of his influence into 
the opposite scale ; and the despised rose to honour, 
while the proud despiser was overwhelmed with disgrace. 
The morality of the human spirit is affected by this 
emotion. Why does God everywhere express his abhor- 
rence of it ? — Because it dishonours him ; retards, if it 
does not prevent, the improvement of the soul, and 
inflicts untold miseries on others. In a measure it 
dethrones God, and deifies self; renders the man blind 
to his faults and wants ; occasions his rejection of help 
as a matter of grace, when it cannot be received in any 
other way ; and induces him to disregard and wound the 
feelings of others, both by speech and action. 



SJiamc. 135 



DIVISION II. 



DISAGREEABLE EMOTIONS. 
CHAPTER XVII. 

6.— 1. SHAME, 

Man is no stranger to disagreeable emotions. He has 
in himself all the elements of trouble ; and he lives in a 
world where these elements are constantly liable to 
disturbing influences. Much within is unsatisfactory, 
and much without is unpleasant and provoking. Hence 
he is often agitated and impelled by feelings the reverse 
of agreeable. ' On one day he is moved to envy at the 
prosperity, wealth, and splendour of a neighbour ; on 
another he is fired with indignation at what he conceives 
to be his dishonesty and greed. The efforts of a rival 
kindle his jealousy ; his success evokes his hatred. 
The imprudent act of to-day clothes him with shame ; 
to-morrow his soul is flooded with grief on account of 
it. An accusing conscience distracts him with fear ; 
and an accumulation of miseries overwhelms him with 
despair. His path through life is beset with thorns ; 
and happy is he who, by vigilance, can diminish the 
number of his wounds. A brief elucidation of the chief 
disagreeable emotions may add to our conceptions 
of the soul's vast susceptibility of feeling. We begin 
with, — 



136 Christian Psychology : 

• 

Shame. — This emotion is a feeling of uneasiness, 
heat, and depression, occasioned by an unpleasant or 
unexpected exposure. The symptoms of the emotion 
vary largely in degree. The uneasiness may be a 
momentary tremor or positive restlessness. The heat 
may be an unseen passing glow, or the clothing of the 
face and neck with a crimson hue from the rushing of 
blood to the head. And the depression may be repre- 
sented by the simple drooping for a moment of the 
eyelids, or by that sinking of spirit expressed by the 
wish to sink into the earth out of sight. In one of its 
stages the emotion assumes the form of modesty ; in 
another that of bashfulness ; it advances to the matured 
form of shame ; and this, in its height, occasioning an 
obstruction of the ordinary exercise of the intellectual 
powers, is spoken of as a confusion of face. As the face 
is the general mirror of the soul, shame can with 
difficulty be restrained from exhibiting its presence by 
suffused features. 

It has just been said that this feeling is occasioned 
by an unpleasant or unexpected exposure. This expo- 
sure may be to one's own self as well as to others. A 
man may be clothed with shame for his conduct in 
private when no mortal eye is on him. The soul has 
the power of looking back on the words, thoughts, and 
deeds of the past, and of bringing these out to the light 
for exposure and reflection, and for comparison with 
some received standard of propriety. If the man is 
not hardened by long continued impropriety of conduct, 
the exposure to himself of some grave misconduct will 
not fail to awaken the uneasiness, the depression and 
the heat of shame. He may have been that day in the 
witness-box, testifying on oath. Anxious to secure a 



Shame. 137 

verdict to the side which he had espoused, he gave a 
colouring" to some facts which the circumstances could 
not warrant, and so created a false impression on 
the listeners. Now in retirement he recalls his expres- 
sions ; and they come not alone, they are attended by a 
feeling which betrays itself in a heated countenance. Or 
he may have spent the afternoon with some jovial 
friends, and partook more freely than he ought of the 
intoxicating glass. The heat of alcohol has passed off 
in some measure, but it is followed by another heat 
which does not elevate but depress, and makes the man 
unwilling to look his fellow mortal in the face. Or in his 
haste to be rich, he has added to the charge for an 
article to a liberal customer who he knew would not call 
in question the price ; and now, on reflection on the 
gains of the day he is uneasy at this transaction, and 
could wish that the additional charge were again in the 
pocket of his liberal customer ; and were the man sud- 
denly to appear before him, the depression of shame 
would appear by a reluctance to look him full in the 
face. Or, reversing the picture in trade, a man may be 
ashamed of the foolish transaction by which he has lost 
a large sum of money. He has been fairly over-reached. 
He has bought for a large sum what is really worth but 
very little, as he now discovers. He cannot reverse the 
bargain. And the more closely he looks into the whole 
affair, the more does he see that he has parted with that 
money which had often comforted him against the 
thoughts of want. He is uneasy, heated, depressed ; he 
is heartily ashamed of his folly. We pass by the gross 
misdemeanors, such as forgery, lewdness, and violence ; 
the brazen face alone can remain unchanged on the 
exposure of such deeds to the eye of the soul, even in 
the absence of every fellow mortal. 
1 



138 Christian Psychology : 

When modesty is exhibited, the exposure has not 
been wholly agreeable. Internal nature in some part 
shows its uneasiness and disagreement. Yet a proper 
degree of modesty is becoming in all, but especially in 
women. The want of it would be a marked defect. To 
woman has been given for wise ends a keener suscepti- 
bility to this emotion. Her modest retirement is her 
attraction ; her sensitive yielding, her strength ; and her 
shrinking from observation, her elevation to notice ; 
while the opposite display creates an immediate repulsion 
in the breast of every right-minded person. Modesty 
and humility are twin graces ; and they are never far 
removed from high moral worth. See the maiden go 
forward to receive a prize for distinguished progress in 
learning, before a large number of spectators. Her 
cheeks and brow betoken a feeling most appropriate 
for the occasion. See the intelligent and clear- 
headed lad on the same arena, called up to demon- 
strate a difficult problem in Euclid on the black-board. 
Tremulous with emotion, indicating the uneasiness of 
a sensitive nature at the general exposure, he proceeds, 
chalk in hand, from stage to stage till the successful 
termination is greeted with loud applause. Few have 
been able, in addressing a public audience for the first 
time, in circumstances which admit of no retreat and 
when high expectations have been raised, to conceal 
the working of this feeling. Ample preparations may 
have been made, and there may be no lack of moral 
courage, but if there is not a depression of spirit there 
is at least an uneasiness combined with heat, the result 
of no mere excitement or timidity, but of that discon- 
certing influence which this emotion wields. So the 
inexperienced preacher generally feels when, exposed to 
the gaze of many, he rises up in the pulpit for the first 



Shame. 1 39 

time to address a curious audience. Not less does the 
aspirant to legislative honors feel when he invites the 
attention of the assembled representatives of his country 
to listen to his maiden speech. False notions about 
the ease and coolness by which these performances 
might be gone through are easily dispelled by the 
experiment. 

In bashfulness the element of depression is specially 
developed. The drooping of the head, so natural to a 
bashful person, indicates the sinking of the spirit. The 
soul of the individual is oppressed and consequently 
depressed by a sense of the superiority, the greatness 
or the grandeur of the assembly to which he is intro- 
duced. This subjection of the spirit 'is often attended 
by a partial stupidity, which renders the person 
awkward in his movements, and strips him of the ease 
and gracefulness so essential to polite demeanour. 
Bashfulness is an excess, and so far it is weakness — 
but it is readily borne by less sensitive minds whose 
sympathy it evokes ; while the opposite extreme, 
impudence, naturally and properly excites disgust and 
indignation. 

When full-blown shame is displayed by an exposure 
to others, the heat of this emotion becomes conspicuous. 
The person has run counter to the fashions of the day, 
disregarded the habits of society, violated the laws of 
the land, or transgressed the laws of God. A detection 
in or conviction of the fault is attended with the 
uneasiness and heat of this feeling. The emotion of 
pride often gives weight to the exposure, and increases 
the feelings of shame. A lady has the courage to 
appear in a dress quite out of date ; but on meeting 
several of her own sex attired in the very height of the 



140 Christian Psychology : 

prevailing fashion, she cannot suppress the flush that 
mantles her countenance. A man who was once pos- 
sessed of great wealth, and had employed many men 
in his service, is constrained by what is called the turn 
of the wheel of fortune to descend to the position of 
the day labourer. While working with pick and shovel 
in the garb of the quarryman, he is accosted by those 
who knew and associated with him in the days of his 
splendour. The remembrance of the past, the contrast 
between his appearance and theirs, the pride of family 
not yet extinct, the undesired and unexpected exposure 
of his present poverty and degradation, bring restless- 
ness to his nerves and perspiration to his brow, and if 
he were to express the wish of his heart, it would be, 
that they were a hundred miles away. Better thoughts 
might assure him that honest labour is no disgrace ; 
but feelings often rush beyond the restraints of sober 
judgment. The cashier of a bank had a high reputation 
for integrity, honour, and all the graces of a sober- 
minded gentleman. In an evil hour he resolved to 
appropriate for private ends the notes entrusted to his 
keeping. Years pass on, and he wears the appearance 
of a diffident and humble man. At length the truth 
comes out ; an examination of accounts proves a 
defalcation somewhere ; to the amazement of all it is 
traced home to the cashier. Judge of his emotions 
when confronted by those whose duty it is to lay bare 
the guilt. The face is clothed with something more 
than diffidence ; and humility, however genuine, gives 
place to a depression of spirits which claims the 
paternity of burning shame. Or the contrast may be 
between profession and practice in matters of religion. 
The professor of religion may be unexpectedly found 



Shame. 141 

consorting with the lewd, with Sabbath-breakers, or 
with the riotous, by the officer of justice, the appre- 
hender of offenders, who knows his position in the 
church of the most Holy. Not yet hardened by crime, 
he would fain hide his face from the gaze of the police- 
man ; but called by name he must answer, and 
apprehended by authority he must go. Now he is 
abashed ; but the confusion of shame awaits him in 
the trial of offenders. 

Defeat and disappointment frequently occasion an 
exposure which culminates in shame. The man who 
entered battle with a high head and boastful language, 
returns defeated with crest fallen and lips sealed in 
silence. The unsuccessful competitor who boasted of 
his election before the contest, returns ashamed to his 
house on the declaration day, The servant who per- 
suaded his master to join in a speculation, by strong 
assertions of great gain, is ashamed to look him in the 
face when the actual results prove the enterprise to be 
a ruinous loss. Most common is this emotion in 
children and servants, when summoned into the 
presence of parents and masters, after gross misconduct. 
How often should shame cover us when we approach 
our heavenly Father, our supreme Master ! 

This emotion is designed by our Creator to preserve 
the decencies and promote the refinements of social 
life ; to conserve a due subordination to authority ; and 
to restrain from improprieties and sin. It may how- 
ever be subdued. A continued disregard of moral 
right, and specially of personal purity, will produce a 
callousness which will go far to rob the soul of this 
power of exercising a wholesome restraint on what 
tends to disgrace and ruin it. 



142 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



•II. HATRED. 



This emotion is a movement of the soul, more or less 
intense, to effect a separation between itself and some- 
thing seen to be inferior, worthless or vile. It is 
experienced in various grades, from the mildest dislike 
to the strongest abhorrence. Yet in all the character- 
istic effort for separation is prominent ; as that of 
fastening on or cleaving to is prominent in the opposite 
emotion of love. In the primary effort the soul seems 
to aim at the removal of the object disliked ; in a 
secondary, the removal of itself from what is hated ; 
and when the detestation is strong a simultaneous effort 
to force the loathed object away and hurry itself from 
it. In every case the thought, object or person, is 
perceived to be at least inferior, it may be worthless, or 
possibly vile or disreputable. This perception or con- 
ception, whether true or false, gives rise to the emotion. 
The soul very properly rises to effect a separation 
from what it conceives to be mean or corrupt. That 
is, the soul's action may be natural and thus appropriate, 
although the judgment which has given birth to it may 
be sadly astray. In ignorance man is often found 
hating what he should love, and loving what he should 
hate ; but in both cases there is a natural cause. 

The human soul is familiar with this emotion. It 
is a frequent and sometimes a friendly visitor. The 



Hatred. 743 

upright man often finds within himself that which 
demands the calling forth of this feeling. A passing 
object or thought calls up a train of reflections, in 
which are blended thoughts unjust, envious, or it 
may be unwise. Against these his soul must rise in 
strong dislike for their immediate expulsion. If this 
may not be done by direct effort, the offensive thoughts 
are covered from sight by attention being directed to 
something more agreeable and becoming. The immoral 
are also often dissatisfied with their own thoughts, and 
seek to rid themselves of their presence. The remem- 
brance of evil deeds comes up more frequently than they 
wish, and with it the sting of conscience. Fears of 
retribution and a day of vengeance follow in close com- 
pany. All this is distressing; and a marked antipathy 
to these disagreeable intruders is shown by a decided 
effort to remove or stifle them. In this case the emotion 
is misdirected. It should be launched against the evil 
deeds, and not against their timely condemnation, by a 
friendly voice giving warning of a possible future 
vengeance. 

In the conduct of others there is often much to call 
forth not simply dislike, but abhorrence. We dislike the 
grasping covetousness which will never afford an advan- 
tage to a neighbour; and the double dealing of false 
friends who are like a limb out of joint, an attempt to 
lean on them resulting in a painful fall. We hate the 
hypocrisy which makes a profession of religion the 
stepping-stone to the attainment of some worldly object; 
and the actions of the vile slanderer who labours to strip 
us of all usefulness and respectability. We detest the 
villainy of the man that robs a poor widow of all her 
worldly goods, when entrusted with their management ; 



144 Christian Psychology : 

and the treachery of a Joab that could stab a rival while 
professing friendship ; or a Judas that could sell his 
master for money, and then point him out to the arrest- 
ing foe by a kiss. We abhor the infernal inhumanity of 
the Popish Inquisition ; and the barbarous cruelty of the 
Chinese who slaughter captive rebels as if they were 
cattle. And we loathe the vileness of those who 
degrade themselves beneath the beasts in yielding to 
their insatiable lusts ; and not less the infamous gain 
of those who grow rich by pandering to the corrupt pro- 
pensities of human nature. 

But if there is a commendable, there is also a con- 
demnable hatred. There is a world that loves iniquity 
and hates righteousness. They detest warning, counsel, 
and instruction. They hate the light because their deeds 
are evil, and cannot bear its disclosures. By such all 
virtuous strictness is disliked ; attention to the duties of 
religion is despised ; and piety is treated with contempt. 
Through the perversion of their judgments, influenced 
largely by their positive choice of evil, sometimes as 
good, and their habits, they regard what is superior as 
inferior, what is most precious as worthless, and what is 
holy and desirable as vile and detestable, and hence the 
channels in which this powerful emotion finds an outlet. 
To regulate the feeling aright, we must rectify the 
judgment. 

If evil deeds evoke hatred, it should not surprise us if 
the doctrines which are supposed to produce them should 
elicit the same feeling. Hence religious opinions have 
sometimes been regarded with extreme abhorrence. 
With no other feelings can we read of the dogmas 
of Moloch, the Carthaginian Baal, and the Druids in 
their prescription of human victims, infants and adults, 



Hatred. 145 

as sacrifices to propitiate their deity. In the same way 
we detest the infamous prostitution demanded of the 
votaries of Astarte; the shastras of India that could 
sanction infanticide; and the Thug superstition that could 
presume to sanctify murder. And would our souls be in 
the right mood if we read with anything short of abhor- 
rence the regulations in respect to the torture unto death 
of so-called heretics by the most terrible engine of oppres- 
sion which the earth ever heard of — the Inquisition ? 
The preaching of the gospel of salvation by Jesus Christ 
inflamed the rulers of the Jews with hatred against the 
apostles. How thoroughly the Pharisees detested the 
teachings of Jesus of Nazareth ! How abominable at 
one time to the soul of Saul of Tarsus was the doctrine 
of salvation by the cross ! How the Sanhedrim loathed 
the speech of Stephen when they gnashed their teeth at 
him ! In this case, as often happens, anger, after 
following closely on the heels of hatred, outstripped it 
and took the lead. That doctrine is generally hated 
which interferes with the pleasures or the profits of men. 
The silversmiths of Ephesus regarded with abhorrence 
the doctrines taught by Paul, as they sapped the foun- 
dation of their trade. The priests of Rome, in the 
palmy days of Romanism, could not tolerate the 
teachings of Wickliffe and of Huss, as they interfered 
largely with their sensual indulgences. And wherever 
antagonistic tenets are set forth in public controversy, 
as Protestant and Roman Catholic, Calvinistic and 
Arminian, the keen and vehement supporters on each 
side treat with loathing the assertions made by their 
opponents. Some, to mark their abhorrence of what 
they do not like to hear, remove their souls from im- 
pressions by putting their hands to their ears, or in a more 



146 Christian Psychology : 

demonstrative manner, by abruptly rising and leaving 
the place. In so doing they may be acting rightly, 
for no man should listen to blasphemy or vile discourse 
who can remove beyond hearing ; or wrongly, if what 
is spoken is the truth, which is profitable to them, 
although contrary to preconceived opinions. 

Persons are, perhaps, the objects of antipathy as 
frequently as thoughts, deeds, and doctrines. It is 
difficult for man to look upon the person who has done 
him much harm in a very base manner with any other 
feelings than those of strong dislike. There is a legiti- 
mate hatred of wrong-doers. The most Holy " abhors 
the bloody and deceitful man ;" he " hates all workers 
of iniquity." The Saviour loathed the lukewarm pro- 
fessors of Laodicea. It is just to conclude that those 
who are habitually under his influence will entertain 
similar feelings towards the same characters. Hence 
we read of the righteous that he " hates them that 
regard lying vanities ; " and " hates with perfect 
hatred," detests or abhors, "those who rise up against 
God." There have been men of such infamy, such 
monsters of cruelty, as Caligula, Nero, and others that 
might be named, that no upright man could look upon 
them without utter loathing. Their wickedness makes 
them objects of abhorrence. As fellow-creatures they 
may be pitied ; but as wicked, vile men they are 
properly hated. An idea is afloat in this age that a 
Christian should show no dislike or hatred to the vilest 
enemy he has — that all his evil doings and sayings 
should be ignored, and that he should be treated as if 
his conduct was commendable. This, we maintain, is 
a pernicious doctrine, if it could be reduced to practice, 
which must rarely be the case. We are ever to do 



Hatred. 147 

good to our enemies — to return good for evil — blessing 
for cursing — but never to confound good and evil, or 
place the both on a level, or be indifferent to either. 
Vile men should be despised in the eyes of the righteous, 
that they may be ashamed and cease to do evil. 
Mischief-makers should not be treated, even by Chris- 
tians, as peace-makers. There should ever be a 
separation of the precious from the vile, and a treatment 
of both according to character; and with the reformation 
of the evil steadily in view while that is possible. 
There is a stage of guilt and degradation beyond which 
we are to mark our abhorrence, by having no fellowship 
whatever. Christians should distinguish between sin 
and the sinner ; and the man should only be the object 
of dislike as an evil-doer, and that in proportion to his 
knowledge of the evil which he was doing and the guilt 
pertaining to the crimes or offences of which he was the 
author. 

High moral principle is necessary to regulate aright 
the outgoing of this emotion. In this the righteous 
man appears to advantage. His character and prin- 
ciples constrain him to put a bridle on this feeling ; 
and while heartily condemning what is sinful, and 
hating even the presence of the vile, he is careful to 
benefit and not to injure those whom he must hate. 
On the other hand, persons not ruled by high moral 
principle allow their animosity, ill-will, and malice, the 
offspring of hate, to have full play, to the lasting injury 
of those they dislike. By their tongues they seek to 
ruin their reputation and business ; and sometimes their 
abhorrence finds vent in personal violence. What 
duels, family and tribal feuds, and national contests have 
sprung from unreasonable hatred ! So prominent has this 



148 Christian Psychology : 

emotion been, that we are spoken of as a race as "hate- 
ful and hating one another" ! When the deed is revenge 
for injury done, there is some excuse ; but often deadly- 
hostility is shown when no evil deed can be named to 
call for such treatment. The question, " Why ? what 
evil hath he done?" can only be truly answered by, 
" We loathe him, and wish him out of the way." And if 
we philosophically inquire how this deep loathing arises, 
we find that the person is presented to the soul as dressed 
in the garb of the vilest criminal — an impostor, a blas- 
phemer, a traitor, or even a foul murderer. So the Romish 
inquisitors dressed their victims with paintings of devils 
to evoke the hatred of the populace as they were led to 
execution. And in our own day the heathen, to arouse 
the people to hate, persecute and murder the christians 
in their country, circulated the lying report that they 
were devourers of the children committed to their care. 
When people are at war hatred is the prevailing feeling. 
The very name of the individual antagonist is hated ; 
every person belonging to the family at feud with another 
is gazed on with abhorrence by the contending parties ; 
and when one nation is in open warfare with another, 
the feeling of hostility is extended to the individuals of 
both nations all over the world, and they cannot meet 
without mutual dislike, if not an open quarrel. Alas ! 
the history of our race has hitherto been a history of 
warfare, and that warfare draws its life-blood from hatred. 
Till sin disappears, hatred cannot, and in one important 
sense should not, disappear. In a sinless world hatred 
is dead. 



Envy. 149 



CHAPTER XIX. 



8.— in. ENVY. 



This is a feeling of poignant uneasiness in the human 
soul at seeing another more honoured, prosperous, or 
successful than itself. It is not a mere dissatisfaction 
with the honour, prosperity, or success of another. That 
may be on very proper grounds ; an injustice may be 
shown ; the person so favoured may be wholly unworthy. 
But when envy arises, there is a comparison between the 
object of envy and itself. In that comparison the soul 
finds itself in an inferior position. Its pride or undue 
self-esteem is wounded. It is uneasy, sometimes pain- 
fully, uneasy, at seeing another in that high position, 
receiving those honours, adorned with that beauty, 
enjoying that wealth, or crowned with that glory which 
it has not, but would have. 

This emotion is more frequently experienced among 
those who have some things in common, as among the 
members of the same family, the students of the same 
seminary, the members of the same military corps, and 
persons of the same profession, legal, medical, and 
clerical. There is a pride in the human heart that will 
not willingly see itself overlooked or outstripped. And 
there is a selfishness there also that would appropriate 
to itself all or many of the best things. Envy leans on 
the two arms of pride on the one side, and desire, in the 



150 Christian Psychology : 

form of covetousness, on the other, They both prop up 
and nurture envy, saying to the soul, " Why should you 
be inferior — this excellence should be yours ? " Some 
mark of favour is shown by a parent to one child over 
others ; a prize is won, or the first place reached after 
keen competition in a seminary; a member of a military 
corps is promoted, contrary to the expectations of some 
who had carved out that honour for themselves ; this 
lawyer or physician, or clergyman, is the favourite of the 
multitude, and is gathering golden honours, although 
some one can scarcely see why so many should run after 
him, or applaud his talent, or skill, or address ; and this 
disagreeable feeling crops up in looks or language, 
despite, it may be, efforts to keep it down or conceal it, 
with the suppressed reflections, " Why should I be less 
esteemed, and why should not this wealth be mine — I am 
wronged ; there is injustice somewhere ? " A sense of 
injustice is at the root of envy. We do not say that 
there is injustice, but that the soul persuades itself that 
a wrong is done, and that it in some sense is a sufferer. 
Hence the painful uneasiness. It suffers. At the lowest 
consideration, it is thought, the person should not have 
stepped up to that position ; he did a wrong to others 
who were better fitted for or more entitled to that place ; 
and all who helped him up or put him in that office, were 
guilty of injustice in not selecting some one else, not 
excluding the complainer, and helping him to the coveted 
honour. Under the impression that the object of envy 
has done him a wrong, the envier strongly dislikes him, 
and can scarcely say a good word about him ; and those 
who helped him up to honour come in for a full share of 
the displeasure, if not positive hatred. Nor does the 
dislike stop short with humanity ; it is even directed 



Envy. 1 5 1 

against the sovereign Disposer of all things for not 
having equally favoured the envious one. 

Envy is not limited to those who have a community 
of interests. It is felt by those who are far removed 
from each other. The servant-maid may envy her 
mistress for the ease, the wealth, and splendour which 
she sees her possess ; and yet, unknown to that servant, 
the mistress may envy her for her liberty, her youth, and 
her beauty. The street-sweeper, looking upon the rich 
driving past in their decorated carriages, rolling in 
wealth and surfeited with luxury, may be pained with 
uneasiness at the contrast between his position and 
theirs, and feel that but for the partiality shown by some 
one, that position of honour and enjoyment might be his. 

A wise observer of human nature asks, — " Who can 
stand before envy ? " The reason is obvious. Envy is 
keenly persevering and ruthlessly destructive. Like 
other emotions of the soul, it moves not alone. It 
secures the aid of others. On the sight of some one in 
favour or prosperity it cries out to the soul, — "You are 
wronged, and this one is the occasion of it." Pride 
joins in and exclaims, — " Yes, bring him down from his 
height." Covetousness follows, and says with emphasis, 
— " Seize what he possesses, and make it your own." 
Hatred comes to the front and looks at him with 
swelling malignity, and roars out, — " Defame him, 
destroy him." And if necessity calls for it, Anger will 
lend a helping hand before Envy be allowed to fail in 
her design. Commanding such powerful aid, no wonder 
if men have fallen before its bitter and protracted 
animosity. The history of the favoured race of Israel 
affords some striking illustrations of this emotion. There 
is no nation and no community in which illustrations 



152 Christian Psychology : 

do not abound ; but those of Israel have a permanency 
in sacred history which hands them down to all ages, and 
proclaims them to the wide world. In the first family 
Cain envied Abel because the latter was blessed with 
marks of the divine favour. Pride and hatred gave their 
ready assistance till passion seized the control of the 
man, and murder was the result of envy, fed by pride and 
hatred. Laban looks with envious eyes on Jacob's 
ever-increasing stock, notwithstanding all efforts to stop 
that increase, and at length his dissatisfaction and 
uneasiness will not suffer him to look his son-in-law 
fair in the face. Joseph's brethren mark the fondness 
of their father for him ; and as one gift after another 
shows a special esteem not extended to them, they 
look on the father's favourite with envy. Hatred 
joins hand in hand with envy, and they are prepared 
on a fitting opportunity to put him out of the way. 
That opportunity is given through the kindness of the 
parent and the fidelity of the son, and the brother is sold 
into slavery ; and a lie that would rend the father's 
heart is devised to prevent all search for the favourite 
son. The position of honour and authority occupied by 
Moses and Aaron in the wilderness, make them the 
objects of envy to their brethren of the same tribe, and 
to some of the tribe of the first-born Reuben. A for- 
midable rebellion is the result ; and this is only quashed 
by a terrible display of divine vengeance, in the sudden 
destruction of the chief conspirators. The injudicious 
praise of the daughters of Israel evokes the envy of Saul, 
the king, and the youthful hero David must become a 
fugitive for seven long years to escape the ire of the 
envious monarch. Ephraim is the crown of the glory 
of Israel, for on him rests the chief blessing which per- 



Envy. 153 

tained to Joseph ; but to Judah pertains the sovereignty 
and the temple ; hence Ephraim envies Judah the pos- 
session of these honours ; and Judah in return vexes 
Ephraim in retaliation for every display of resentment. 
The high position and great honour bestowed on Daniel 
could not escape the notice of the court of Darius. They 
ask themselves, " Why should this Jew hold the highest 
place under our monarchy, as under the Babylonian ? 
Must he ever be chief, no matter who conquers ? Is 
there no Median or Persian fit to fill this post ? Must we 
serve under this man whom our nation has conquered ?" 
These are the outgoings of envy, but they have a show 
of justice and reason about them. They may all be 
answered ; but the rejoinder will come back, — to the 
victors belong both the spoils and the honours. Nursing 
this sense of injustice, envy pierces their souls, and they 
lay wait to find fault with him. He reads their purpose, 
and is on his guard. All his public business is so care- 
fully, wisely, and punctually discharged that they can 
find no loophole by which to shoot an arrow at him. His 
strict religious habits give them a hold on him. The 
snare is laid for the king, and he falls into it, for he it is 
who has continued this Daniel in such high honour. 
The enemy has triumphed over the upright, as he is 
often allowed to do, but not over God. The den of 
lions is indeed entered ; but the condemned leaves it as 
unharmed as he entered it. And now the autocrat takes 
vengeance for the snare cast over him ; and the 
envious are devoured by the choice of their own passion. 
A higher and holier than Daniel is before us in the 
same history. The Messiah has come. His doctrines 
and manner of life disappoint the rulers of the Jews. 
He is not the Christ for whom they looked, and they 
k 



154 Christian Psychology : 

will have none of him. Yet his powers of working 
miracles, his benevolence, his blameless life and pro- 
found wisdom create a deep impression wherever he goes. 
At times the populace are moved to enthusiasm in his 
favour. Should the people yield to his doctrines, these 
rulers, priests, scribes, pharisees, must sink into con- 
tempt, for this Teacher never ceases to expose them to the 
reprobation of the whole land. Why should he supplant 
them? — this untutored prophet of Galilee! — this ignoble 
man of no reputation for birth or learning ! Why 
should he carry all before him by giving out that 
he is the Son of David ? His power and popularity 
incite their envy. They must put him out of the way. 
When the crowds shout before and behind him on 
his march — " Hosanna to the Son of David " — they 
are roused to action. He is soon after seized and 
brought before a Roman Governor, as if he were 
an enemy to Caesar, who had upheld Caesar's rightful 
authority, and as if they were friends of Caesar, 
who hated the very shadow of his authority. No ; 
let the truth be told. They are moved by envy. 
They would have his powers but cannot reach 
them — they would have his deep sagacity, but it 
is beyond their grasp — they would have his great 
influence with the people, but they cannot secure it. 
Had he no power, no influence, they would be content 
to despise him and leave him alone. But he has what 
they have not — the power to command support where 
he likes, and an influence with the masses of the people 
which can bear down all opposition. They are over- 
shadowed by such greatness and popular influence. 
He must disappear. Who can stand before the envy 
of the highest authority in any land ? He must give 



Envy. 1 5 5 

place, for envy is cruel and inexorable. Pilate yields 
to their clamour, prompted by hatred, begotten of 
envy. Immanuel dies the victim of envy. 

Unlike other emotions which in their development 
may become immoral and sinful, this emotion from 
its feeblest current to its highest restlessness is im- 
proper and immoral. We speak not of ordinary dis- 
satisfaction at ill-gotten wealth or honours. That is not 
envy. But we speak of the hateful uneasiness laden 
with pain at the sight of the superiority of another in 
any desirable possession, obtained in the common evolu- 
tions of life. Such a feeling strikes at the sovereignty of 
God. It seems to say "the providence of God is wrong." 
Its thought is "that honour, wealth, pleasure, beauty, is 
not rightly bestowed ; I should have had it, injustice is done 
to me ; or I am at least as much entitled to receive it as 
this person." This is wrong. If a person has obtained 
his goods fairly, or won his position honourably, we have 
no right to envy him, he has done us no wrong ; and we, 
in envying him, hate him, and are tempted to disparage 
and defame him. If the person has beauty or talent, or 
wealth or rank by birth, it is the direct gift of God, and 
shall we find fault with God ? May he not bestow his 
own on whom he pleases ? And will we be in pain and 
cherish ill-will because God has chosen to bestow his 
favours on some one else, and not on us ? He has done 
us no wrong, as we were unworthy of the least of his 
mercies. If wealth or position has come in the occur- 
rences of life, this also is from God, as promotion comes 
not from east or west, that is by mere chance ; but God 
puts down one and sets up another, through the agency 
both of bad and good men. Let us suppress the first 
rising of envy, and be content with our portion and 



156 Christian Psychology : 

position, as measured and marked out from time to time 
by the unerring hand of God. We may also ponder with 
profit the lines of the poet : — 

" Honour and fame from no condition rise, 
Act well thy part, there all the honour lies." 



Jealousy. 1 5 7 



CHAPTER XX. 



.IV. JEALOUSY, 



Closely related to the preceding is Jealousy. This 
emotion is a burning feeling kindled within the soul by 
an apprehension or suspicion of wrong sustained, or 
about to be sustained, by our rights, or the rights of 
one we make our own, in the regard or affections of 
one esteemed or loved, being tampered with or 
destroyed. It is allied to envy, inasmuch as both 
spring from an apprehension of one being out of place 
to our injury in some form, and are both attended with 
feelings of keen dislike, — amounting at times to an 
inability to think or speak favourably — respecting the 
person seen or suspected of occupying this improper 
position. Such was the conception of the relationship 
of these two emotions by the ancients that one term 
was made by some of them to express both feelings. 
For example, the Hebrews employed qineah, and the 
Greeks £vjAo£, zelos, for envy and jealousy alike; although 
the Greeks used also another term $$ovo;, phthonos, for 
envy. Yet the two emotions are quite distinct. You 
may envy a man of whom you are not jealous. You 
may envy him for his personal appearance, great talent, 
wealth, grandeur, and respect, but you are not jealous 
of him, for you have no apprehension that he is 
tampering with your dearest rights, or secretly under- 
mining your position. And you may be jealous of a 



158 Christian Psychology : 

man whom you do not envy. You may be jealous of 
him because of his suspicious or unbecoming appear- 
ance, language, or conduct, but you do not envy him ; 
you would not exchange places with him ; on the 
contrary, you disregard his position as having no 
attractions for you, and you detest his conduct as mean 
in the extreme. In envy two persons only are generally 
concerned, the object and the subject of envy. But in 
jealousy three persons are frequently concerned, the 
object concerning whom you are jealous, the immediate 
occasioner of the jealousy, and yourself. And some- 
times there may be a fourth ; that is, there may be a 
twofold subject, a duplicate of it, the one the agent, the 
friend, the servant of the other ; and the feeling may 
burn in one or both at the same time. 

Suspicion is not jealousy, though closely related to it. 
You may be suspicious of a man's words or conduct, as 
not being what is professed ; but you are not jealous of 
him as seeking to rob you of what you prize very highly. 
Yet you are seldom jealous without being suspicious at 
the same time of almost everything about him who is 
the occasion of the jealousy. Suspicion is often related 
to jealousy, as cause and effect. You suspect, that is, 
you imagine or conceive without proof, that a man has 
been, in your absence, worming his way into the esteem 
of one you highly regard, to your injury or exclusion, 
and the feeling of jealousy is kindled and cannot long 
be concealed. It is a fire which must have some outlet. 
Bat jealousy often rests on stronger grounds than mere 
suspicion. The subject of the emotion may have 
ocular demonstration of the attempt to do him wrong 
in his tenderest and most sacred feelings, or to defeat 
some project which lies very near his heart. 



Jealousy. 159 

The heat and force of jealousy are in proportion to 
the interest felt in the person or thing, of or over which 
a man is jealous. The emotion is evoked when in 
possession of the object prized, and when there is 
rivalry for the possession of what has not yet been 
appropriated. The careful and correct use of prepo- 
sitions in connection with this feeling is important. 
We* are said to be jealous of, for, over, and on account 
of persons. The object or person who is prized or 
loved is the proper object of jealousy, and the person 
who is the immediate occasioner of this feeling, whose 
conduct gives rise to it, is the one on account of whom 
you are jealous. In common language, however, the of 
is used both for the object of the emotion and for the 
immediate occasioner of it, but not with sufficient accu- 
racy. If a man said, — " I am jealous of that woman," 
most persons would imagine that she was the object of 
jealousy, and was consequently prized, but he might 
mean by that same expression that he was jealous on 
account of her, having nothing but dislike towards her, 
and fearing her presence in his house as destructive to 
his domestic peace, by instilling false notions into those 
he loved. Hence the propriety of avoiding ambiguity 
by the use of appropriate prepositions. 

Can anything inanimate be the object of jealousy ? 
Yes, frequently. We may be jealous of or over our 
reputation, trade, or the interests and honour of our 
country. Yet generally we are jealous of and on 
account of persons. But it must be noted that the 
object and subject of jealousy are so closely connected 
that the subject claims a property in, or oneness with, 
or closest relation to the object of jealousy, whether it 
be an inanimate object or a person, so that the injury 



160 Christian Psychology : 

dreaded or done to the object comes home to the heart 
of the subject and kindles the emotion. An event, such 
as the discovery of a letter, without any clue to the 
knowledge of the agent or writer, is often the occasion 
of jealousy. The deed is there, and tells its own tale ; 
but the doer, who by this deed has made us jealous is 
unknown. You may say that the event has occasioned 
your jealousy, or that you are jealous on account of 
some unknown agent or writer. It amounts to the 
same. The actor speaks through his deed, and the 
writer by his letter, either for himself or another. 

A man is jealous of his reputation. To a proper 
extent he ought to be. Men in public positions depend 
largely upon their acceptability with their fellow-men. 
Few can safely disregard the persistent attempts of 
enemies to destroy a man's character. He who is 
exposed to such injuries should be jealous. He may 
not close the mouths of foolish talkers or of slanderers, 
and he cannot stop the press when under the control 
of men of no moral principle, but he ought sometimes 
at least to answer a fool according to his folly, and 
sometimes to claim his rights of protection as a citizen. 
This emotion is fitted to stimulate him to his duty in 
protecting his good name when most unjustly assailed. 
While he ought not to notice every dog that barks, but 
hold on his way in the path of honour and integrity, he 
may err to his own injury and the injury of those near 
to him by too great indifference to the defamation of an 
abusive press, seen and read by the general public. 

A man is jealous over a business which he has made 
his own. By some chemical discovery or mechanical 
invention he has started a fair trade, which will soon 
enrich him if left to himself exclusively. But he learns 



Jealousy. 1 6 1 

that others are actively exploring the ground where he 
discovered his treasure, and their efforts arouse his 
jealousy. His patent will be jealously guarded. The 
public will be cautioned against all counterfeits of the 
genuine article. He will be particularly careful not to 
give any valuable information to a suspected inquirer. 
And every rumour that reaches him of a near approach 
to his own discovery or invention will furnish fresh fuel 
to keep the emotion aglow. 

The departments of civil governments, when the 
ruling party have been overthrown by a general election, 
are generally the scenes where this emotion burns in 
many faces. Many applicants press their claims to 
office. They inquire who are seeking the same situation. 
From that moment the rivals are eyed with jealousy. 
Except among the nobler spirits, there is no wish to 
meet, or recognise, or speak to each other. Diplomatic 
circles are not free from the same evil feeling. When 
two contending nations are seeking the alliance of a 
third, the agents of both meet on common ground, and 
every art and argument is seized by each to influence 
to his side the arbiter in the contests. Every symptom 
that the opponent is making a deep impression evokes 
the jealousy of his antagonist, and he strives by a fresh 
counteractive to neutralize the work of his opponents. 

Sometimes a zealous and faithful servant may be said 
to be jealous for his master, that is, for his honour and 
his rights. So Elijah, the prophet, speaking of himself, 
says, il I have been very jealous for the Lord God of 
Hosts." He had identified himself with his master's 
cause — his very soul was wrapped up in it ; whatever 
touched Jehovah's honour touched his heart. That 
honour had been basely trampled in the dust. Israel, 



1 62 Christian Psychology : 

who had been married to the Lord by a holy covenant, 
had recently given her homage and confidence to Baal, 
a small remnant alone remaining faithful. The servant 
who had made his master's honour his own, had his 
jealousy kindled into a flame on witnessing the daily 
proofs of Israel's" [infidelity to her great Redeemer-Hus- 
band. The language is both appropriate and deeply 
impressive. In similar terms, Paul says of the Corin- 
thian church, " I am jealous over you with godly 
jealousy." He had felt as Elijah felt — had made Christ's 
honour his own; and every movement on the part of the 
Corinthian church that indicated alienation from Christ, 
to whom she was pledged, seemed to him like the unfaith- 
ful dealing of a betrothed virgin. After an engagement 
has taken place, both parties are naturally jealous of any 
conduct that looks towards a breach of promise. And 
if the engagement has been made on the part of the 
future husband, by proxy — by a friend warmly attached 
and anxious to be faithful — his friend will be jealous over 
the party espoused, as if he was a principal in the case. 
In conjugal relationships this emotion engages most 
frequent attention. A husband becomes jealous of his 
wife for her extravagant efforts to please other men, and 
her readiness to receive undue attention from them. And 
a wife becomes jealous of her husband for his familiarity 
with other women, and his desire to please and honour 
them while she is, or imagines that she is, slighted. 
And when this fire is fully kindled, it has the heat of 
11 coals of juniper." It devours soothing and conciliatory 
arguments as the flame consumes the stubble. Next to 
it in strength is the jealousy of rivals, male or female, in 
seeking to secure this important relationship. So violent 
has been this feeling that the death of the antagonist 



Jealousy. 163 

has not only been desired, but actually sought, and even 
attempted both by poison and violence. This, however, 
is rare ; but the fire burns fiercely as often as the occa- 
sion brings up the form of the rival. 

In respect to morality, this emotion, unlike envy, may 
be allowable, beneficial or honourable. God is jealous ; 
that is, he has a burning regard for his own honour, 
and will not suffer his rights in the affections and con- 
fidence of his people to be tampered with with impunity. 
Within certain limits the exercise of this emotion in a 
man's own behalf is beneficial ; in behalf of other men it 
is often commendable ; and when evoked from a pure 
regard for the glory of God, it is in the highest degree 
honourable. 



164 Christian Psychology 



CHAPTER XXI. 



10.— v. ANGER. 



This is the uprising of the soul, often swift and sharp, 
against the doer or supposed doer of some injury or 
wrong. It is one of the strongest, as it is the fiercest, 
of the emotions of the human spirit. Like others, it 
exhibits various degrees. You may behold it in the 
sudden flush that finds expression in the harsh word 
or fierce look, and in the wild fury that spurns all res- 
traint. Its different forms or degrees have their peculiar 
designations ; as, in addition to the common term, 
there are resentment, indignation, wrath,, rage, and 
fury. In no age, rank, or class, is it inoperative. The 
child changes colour because its toy is wrenched from its 
grasp ; the monarch fumes because some servant has 
dared to frustrate his purpose ; the savage hurls his stone 
or launches his spear against the man who has upbraided 
him ; while the more cultivated mortal allows his tongue 
or his pen to be the vehicle of his keen displeasure. 
Disappointments, disobedience, personal injuries, base 
injustice, and cruel wrongs, are the chief provocatives 
of this emotion. The immigrant who finds poverty 
where he expected wealth ; idleness where he expected 
ample remunerative labour; a chill, miserable climate, 
where he expected perpetual summer, vents his re- 
proaches, if not his imprecations, on the heads of the 
agents who were instrumental in inducing him to leave 



Anger. 165 

comfort at home for wretchedness abroad. So Israel of 
old "chode" with Moses when pressed with the wants 
of the wilderness ; and at a later day, when indisposed 
to fight for the possession of Canaan, proposed " to 
stone " the men who would advise a bold advance upon 
the promised territory. When the disappointment is 
traced to deception in the withholding of support in a 
grave juncture ; to negligence in the payment of money 
most urgently needed ; to treachery, in the refusal of tes- 
timony in a most important case, although repeatedly 
promised and fully relied upon, — the emotion finds utter- 
ance in the expressions of deepest indignation. The dis- 
appointment felt by the prophet sent to Nineveh because 
that city was not overthrown, according to his prediction, 
was so great that it evoked the bitter reply, " I do well 
to be angry, even unto death.'" 

Disobedience does not always call forth displeasure. 
A man may smile in finding that his orders have not 
been carried out. It may have been most prudent to 
disobey. But in other circumstances anger breaks out 
violently when the discovery is made that important 
orders on which many valuable lives depend have been 
wilfully neglected. When expedition, skill, and courage, 
are demanded under the eye of an officer, blundering and 
timidity are too often visited by expressions that show 
the force of the displeasure. In the family circle, and in 
the common school, persistent disobedience in things 
requiring care and attention, will properly awaken anger 
though it ever should be held under restraint. A refusal 
to comply with the unreasonable request of a haughty 
eastern despot, evoked a feeling which demanded the 
removal of the Persian queen from her high position. 
The babes at Bethlehem felt the weight of Herod's wrath 



1 66 Christian Psychology : 

because the wise men dared to disregard his command 
to point out the home where the infant Messiah lay. 

When a man is smarting under personal injuries, 
anger quickly springs up. If smitten, he is very apt to 
smite in return, under the promptings of this fierce 
emotion, irrespective of the injurious consequences to 
himself as well as to the aggressor. If meanly and 
unworthily treated by those on whom he had strong 
claims for brotherly regard, this feeling may take the 
form of resentment. Dislike is blended with anger. 
Displeasure is cherished. The fire smoulders within 
him ; a passing word may open a rent for the fanning 
breeze ; and the grudges of years of antipathy may burst 
forth to startle the unexpecting beholder. If vilified, or 
even justly exposed for villainy, through the public 
press, he may boil with resentment against the writer, 
and the horsewhip or the revolver may prove the 
strength of the emotion. This is the spring %f quarrels 
which have sprinkled the earth with human blood. 

Sometimes a nation rises up in its wrath against the 
oppression of its rulers. There is a revolution. A sense 
of intolerable injustice evokes indignation against those 
who are charged with robbing and betraying their 
country. Woe unto the rulers who are exposed to the 
rage of an excited and unreflecting populace. The 
ungovernable passions of a mob will wreak ruin on 
every object of its animosity. One man is often the 
object of public indignation. He has showed great 
pusilanimity on the field of battle — or he has concluded 
a most dishonourable peace — or he has enriched 
himself at the public expense — or he has by gross mis- 
management brought the country to the verge of ruin ; 
let the country ring with his evil doings, and impre- 



Anger. i6y 

cations are heaped upon his name, and his very safety 
is endangered on any highway from the wrath that he 
has evoked. 

Some of the fiercest demonstrations of anger have 
occurred when a man or his family have been subjected 
to cruel wrongs. Let an enemy enter a home to drag 
off into slavery or wretchedness a member of the house- 
hold ; what may we not expect from the guardian of 
that home, if tongue can speak or hand can move ? 
When Jacob was pursued and overtaken by his father- 
in-law, as if he had been a thief, and all his property 
ransacked in vain for stolen goods, he gave utterance 
to his wrath against Laban in words that marked the 
intensity of his resentment. When his sons, Simeon 
and Levi, had a wrong to avenge for the seduction of 
their sister, they allowed their anger to burst into a 
flame of outrageous vehemence and ferocity, destroying 
the innocint with the guilty, and plundering and 
enslaving the defenceless. For a similar offence Absalom 
stamped himself with the guilt of a fratricide. In all 
ages, and among all classes, cruel wrongs inflicted on 
members of a family have kindled fires of wrath which, 
have smouldered for years awaiting a day of vengeance. 

Inferior animals, and sometimes inanimate objects, 
come in for a share of the outgoings of this emotion. 
The carter will sternly whip the horse that provokes 
him by constantly backing instead of going forward ; 
The dog that delights to bite may look out for vengeance 
from him whom he has wounded. Balaam's ass suffers 
a severe beating through fierce anger, provoked by a 
bruised leg. Too often, indeed, these dumb animals 
suffer shameful treatment from man when anger has 
reached its height in ungovernable fury. Sometimes 



1 68 Christian Psychology: 

we hear curses heaped upon the stone or root that has 
tripped a man of uncontrolled tongue, to his sore injury. 
And the child may be seen beating with violent feelings 
the thistle that has just pierced his hand or his foot. 

Symptoms of this, as of other emotions, constantly 
appear in the inferior creation. We hear it in the 
growling and savage barking of the watchdog ; we see 
it in the violent kicking of the horse ; in the butting 
of the ram ; and in the pawing and rushing of the bull. 
Sea and air are not free from similar exhibitions of 
animal rage. Anger was designed by our Creator to 
deepen the conception and confirm the abhorrence of 
wrong-doing, to. stay the further progress of evil, and 
to prevent, by awakening fear, its future recurrence ! 
Therefore, though often terribly destructive when unre- 
strained, it is sometimes beneficial. Anger is at times 
strength. A man without it is a weakling. In its 
reasonable development it is not sinful. Mn inspired 
penman writes : " Be ye angry and sin not." To see 
gross violence or injustice perpetrated, and iniquity 
flaunting itself unblushingly without displeasure, reach- 
ing to anger or wrath, is indicative of moral weakness ; 
it is culpable indifference to the existence of sin, if not 
a sympathy with it. The man who broke the tables of 
stone on which the God of the universe had written his 
own law was not blamed for so doing. The deed was 
the outgoing of a righteous indignation at the sight of 
the most provoking idolatry. 

In its best manifestations in the human spirit this 
emotion is but a feeble representation of an attri- 
bute of the deity. " God is angry with the wicked 
every day." Yet he is " slow to anger," indicating the 
restraint placed upon the indignation justly evoked. The 



Anger. 169 

inspired volume gives great prominence to this divine 
attribute. If it break forth upon his foes, the results are 
indescribably terrible. " Who can stand before his indig- 
nation ? and who can abide in the fierceness of his 
anger? — his fury is poured out like fire." " It burns to 
the lowest hell, and none can quench it." It seems an 
essential excellence in the moral governor of the universe, 
whatever notions of it the guilty may prefer to entertain. 
Anger in man must be temporary and controlled. As 
a moral fire, it is a good servant but a bad master. 
" Let not the sun go down upon your wrath." Only in 
the breasts of fools can it find a permanent abode. It 
will consume the man in whom it is allowed to dwell. 
And if through want of proper restraint it oversteps the 
bounds of reason and develops into fury, the conse- 
quences must be injurious, and may be mournfully 
destructive. 



170 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XXII. 



11.— vi. GRIEF. 



Very different from the preceding is the emotion of Grief. 
Instead of rising, shaking off indifference, assuming 
a hostile attitude, or throwing itself with force or violence 
against one conceived to have done, or to be doing 
wrong, as in anger, the soul under this emotion is 
depressed, sinks, is dissolved ; and in extremities is 
poured out to utter exhaustion. Hence these two 
emotions cannot co-exist in the soul, as the one rouses 
and the other depresses it. They may succeed each 
other by turns with great rapidity, but they cannot co- 
operate. Such is true of other emotions. Joy and grief 
cannot co-exist. But it is sometimes amusing to see 
how rapidly they may follow each other. A child may 
be seen crying, and, before he has wiped his eyes, burst 
into laughter ; and again, as in a moment, the joy may 
give place to a fresh burst of sorrow. On the other hand, 
shame and grief may co-exist, as they both depress the 
soul ; and as a matter of fact, they are often seen co- 
operating. In the same way hatred and anger may 
conjointly possess the soul, as they both elevate it, and 
may nourish each other to extreme violence. They do 
not, however, necessarily co-operate ; nor do shame and 
grief; as each of the four may singly possess the soul. 

With the emotion of grief our race has, alas ! the 
closest experience. We begin life with crying, and we 



Grief. 171 

often end it with sighing and tears. Our path through 
life is ever sprinkled with drops of sadness, and often 
drenched with showers of sorrows. It finds expression 
in the sigh of the lonely, in the silent weeping of the 
very sad, in the crying of the bereaved, and in the 
groaning of the distressed ; and manifests its depth and 
power in the wringing of the hands ; in the prostration 
of the body as naturally exhibiting the sinking of the 
spirit; in fainting; in dethroning of reason; and in burst- 
ing of the heart in death. It may pass over us as the 
softly-stealing evening breeze, bending gently the heads 
of the ripening grain, extracting the sigh as it passes ; 
or it may fall upon us as the tempest that prostrates the 
lofty and strongly-rooted tree, crushing the spirit for a 
lifetime by one blow. As joy prompts to speech, so grief 
tends to silence, except when its excess leads to broken 
utterances. Dumbness, or disinclination to utter a word 
sometimes attends extreme grief, arising from some great 
and unexpected calamity. 

Grief is produced by the conception, sight, or expe- 
rience of what is disheartening, painful, distressing, or 
overwhelming. 

The lesser manifestations of this emotion are most 
frequently exhibited by those who are in the decline of 
life, or who have passed from sunshine into shade, from 
company into solitude, from wealth to poverty, or from 
health and pleasure into feebleness and suffering. The 
aged often look back and contemplate with sadness that 
may start a tear, the companions, scenes, and enjoyments 
of former years, now gone never to return. Persons who 
have enjoyed the smiles of this world, who have dwelt 
for years in its sunshine, who rolled in wealth, and 
spent days and nights in feasting and pleasure with 



172 Christian Psychology : 

congenial spirits, cannot be transported into solitude, 
stripped of comforts, embarrassed with poverty, and 
exposed to neglect and suffering without frequent 
depressing reflections that things are no more what 
they once were. And when a man has lost his health 
and sees little prospect of recovering it, sadness will 
force itself upon him, and thoughts will arise of that 
distressing issue dreaded by most, and of the conse- 
quences that may attend it to those near to him, which, 
if alone, may find an outgoing in tears. 

Exhibitions of deeper sorrow are witnessed in persons 
under sharp conviction of folly or sin, and in separation 
of friends who have little hope of meeting again. When 
sin appears in its true character, apart from its conse- 
quences, the human spirit can scarcely refrain from 
deploring its folly. It has returned evil for good ; it 
has offended the most benevolent of beings ; it has 
resisted the most friendly efforts for its welfare ; it has 
despised the richest gifts; it has spent the most valuable 
treasures on trifles ; it has yielded itself a slave to the 
meanest drudgery, and it has preferred the friendship 
of a malicious enemy to the favour of the most gracious 
God, no wonder if the soul sinks in the dust of self- 
abasement and weeps for its base misconduct. A 
sudden fall into sin may be followed by a quick and 
sharp outburst of grief. Such was Peter's grief for 
denying his Master. He went out from the hall, 
when the look of his Master reminded him both of what 
had been foretold and of what had now taken place, to 
pour out the sorrow of his heart in a profusion of tears. 
How common are the expressions of grief on the 
departure of friends. If the distance to be gone Over is 
great, the dangers many, the separation long, and it 



Grief. 173 

may be final, apart from the ordinary vicissitudes of 
life, sadness will claim its place in the heart, and it 
may not be possible for the sternest wholly to suppress 
it. In the streams of emigration now flowing from 
many shores to many quarters of the globe, such 
demonstrations of sorrow are of daily occurrence. At 
times the separation is heart-melting, if not heart- 
rending ; as when a man is compelled to part from his 
family on the eve of execution. See John Rodgers, 
Walter Raleigh, Charles Stuart, or Louis Bourbon — all 
with human hearts, irrespective of rank, leave their 
families to meet their doom at the hands of their fellow- 
men. Who could blame the outgoing of excessive 
grief on such occasions ? Bereavements by death, and 
severe losses by worldly calamities produce the most 
frequent displays of extreme sorrow. How often can 
we trace the footsteps of death in the symptoms of 
sorrow that occupy and surround a dwelling, where the 
wife laments the husband of her youth, the mother 
deplores the loss of her only child, and the father the 
untimely death of a favourite son. The sacred records 
have rendered for ever memorable the poignant grief 
of David the King for his favourite but rebellious son 
Absalom. How intensely bitter the cry, — " Would God 
I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son ! " 
Jacob refused to be comforted when deprived of his 
beloved Joseph, and said, — " I will go down into the 
grave to my son mourning." David's military band, 
when bereaved by a company of robbers of their wives 
and children, wept till they had no more power to weep. 
How general was the grief throughout our empire, a few 
years ago, when the Indian mutiny left scores of men, 



1 74 Christian Psychology : 

women, and children, to the tortures of brutal Sepoys. 
Men have been seen to weep when the labours of many 
years have been swept away in a night by flame or flood. 
The stout-hearted Esau wept most bitterly when told by 
his father that the birth-right blessing was lost to him. 
Some are more susceptible of grief than others. They 
are either naturally more tender-hearted, or they have 
cultivated the finer and gentler feelings of our nature, and 
are more liable to feel what is fitted to give pain or occa- 
sion distress. Such may lament losses which scarcely 
disturb a stronger mind; or they may display a laudable 
and noble grief from their clearer perceptions and finer 
susceptibilities, of which an uncultivated and hard heart 
is wholly incapable. The grief of our Saviour for blinded 
Jerusalem, and the sorrow of Paul for his impenitent 
countrymen, illustrate this gentler and nobler nature as 
distinguished from mere softness of heart. 

When grief becomes extreme, it sometimes assumes 
the form of anguish, and is attended with clenching and 
twisting of the hands, and with wailing. A person may 
be seen in that state when beholding the last agonies of 
a dear relative, the sole stay and support of a house. At 
other times, the load of sorrow compels the person to sit 
on the ground or floor, and throw the head forward, as if 
unable to maintain an erect position. So Job sat for seven 
days in silence, bowed down with a weight of woe that 
seldom or never rested on mortal head before. Hence 
the grief of true repentance is represented by " sitting in 
sackcloth and ashes." Where the emotion is even more 
intense, there is a complete prostration. When He who 
became our substitute carried our sorrows, the weight of 
woe laid upon him wrung out the cry, " My soul is 



Grief. 175 

exceeding sorrowful, even unto death," and so oppressed 
him that he " fell on his face," and implored relief. Well 
might the poet exclaim : — 

" O never, never cans't thou know 

What then for thee the Saviour bore, 

The pangs of that mysterious woe 

That wrung his soul at every pore ; 

The weight that pressed upon his brow — 
The fever of his bosom's core." 

Under the doubly-distressing intelligence received by 
the disconsolate and unfortunate King of Israel in the 
house of the witch of Endor, the once mighty warrior 
threw himself prostrate on the ground, and could only 
be roused by an effort to attempt the now hopeless task 
before him. Sudden and awful bereavements have 
broken down the spirit for the rest of life, leaving the 
mortal a mere wreck of humanity. And heavier still — 
seizing the brain, it has dethroned reason ; and para- 
lyzing the nervous system, it has dissolved the body in 
death. Then " cord," and " bowl," and " pitcher," and 
" wheel," lie a mass of ruins, through the too great strain 
put upon the silver bond uniting head and heart. Grief 
appertains to a state in which the disagreeable or painful 
is either conceived or experienced. Many of the sorrows 
of humanity are caused by physical suffering. The weak- 
ness, wants, wounds, and pains of the body tell directly 
and powerfully upon the mind, and weigh it down in 
sadness or deep distress. As diseases and wants are 
universal, and injuries and pains most frequent every- 
where, grief is universal and permanent on earth. It is 
so as the necessary accompaniment of sin. Sin is oppo- 
sition to the will of Him who is essentially and un- 
changeably happy. As this opposition is universal on 
earth, so its necessary consequence, grief, is universal. 



1 76 . Christian Psychology : 

In the entire absence of all that can wound either mind 
or body, this emotion ceases to appear. Transplant the 
soul to a sinless state, and grief is unknown. 

In our present state the operation of this emotion is in 
measure beneficial. While in excess it paralyzes or des- 
troys both mind and body ; within limits it humbles, and 
in a manner purifies and protects the soul. The man 
who grieves or mourns for a wound, self-inflicted through 
carelessness, or received from another, will naturally take 
more care, and that in proportion to the depth and 
intensity of his grief, to avoid, in the future, what occa- 
sioned the wound, than the man who experienced no 
such grief. Thus it deepens conviction of danger, and 
puts man upon his guard against injury. In like man- 
ner the grief arising from losses and bereavements may 
make us doubly careful to shun all that tends to a repeti- 
tion of these evils. In moral questions the beneficial 
interposition of grief is almost indispensable to improve- 
ment. Hence the aphorism from the mouth of wisdom, 
" Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be com- 
forted ; " and the exhortation as preliminary to reforma- 
tion, " Be afflicted, and mourn and weep." It clothes 
the soul with humility as the first step to a true percep- 
tion of its conduct and position ; it softens it to receive 
deep impressions of its guilt and danger ; and it leaves 
an open door for abhorrence of sin and folly to come in 
and take full possession. Insensibility to guilt, in other 
words, an absence of regret or grief before God for sins 
inseparable from human conduct, argues a hardened 
depravity which endangers the soul. Let us comport 
ourselves as becomes our position till freed from the cause 
of grief, we reach a land where "sorrow and sighing" 
are unknown. 



Fear. 177 



CHAPTER XXIII. 



12. — VII. FEAR. 



This emotion is the soul in a state of uneasiness and 
distress, from the conviction that trouble or danger is at 
hand or about to overtake it. We experience it in 
various degrees, from the uneasiness that excites us to 
unusual vigilance to the terror that demands from us 
the utmost effort to escape from impending woe. The 
emotion shows its presence in the flushed or pallid 
countenance, in the startled eyes, in trembling limbs, in 
the creeping sensation over the head that sets the hair 
erect, in the knocking together of the knees, and in the 
stiffened and paralyzed attitude. It is also at times 
accompanied by shrieks or screams, especially among 
women or children. The evils dreaded are of all sorts, 
physical, mental, moral, and spiritual ; real and 
imaginary. 

Physical and spiritual evils are mainly dreaded by 
man. He is startled by fear when he sees the deadly 
weapon pointed at him, when he sees the lightning 
flash full in his face, when he sees the devouring element 
of fire surrounding him by rushing into his only avenue 
of escape, when he sees the flood of waters rising round 
and his craft sinking in the depths, and when he sees 
the instruments of death prepared for his execution. 
He grows pale when conviction of guilt is borne home 
upon him in the presence of the public, dreading the 



178 Christian Psychology : 

reproof, shame, and punishment that must quickly 
follow. And long before the public have discovered 
his guilt conscience has done its work, threatening him 
every day with exposure of his lying, dishonesty, fraud, 
or forgery, till he stands in dread of every policeman 
whom he meets. When the foul crime of murder has 
been committed, fear becomes a daily, if not a nightly, 
companion. The slain appears in thought continually, 
and he cannot bribe him away, or force him away, or 
coax him not to trouble him any more. The suspicion 
is ever arising that some one has discovered his guilt, 
and that his arrest may be daily looked for. He is 
often literally frightened with his own shadow. At 
times under the impression that he hears some one 
approaching his hiding place, you might hear the 
beating of his heart. Let sickness of a deadly nature 
seize a man, and despite his efforts to keep up a coun- 
tenance, fearfulness of death comes over him, because 
he has caught a sight of the king of terrors standing 
near. Few can look upon death with unshaken nerve. 
Let the plague break out, and alarm seizes the multi- 
tude, business is neglected, houses are closed, the 
market is empty, and families make haste to escape 
from the infected region. Fear is the spur that goads 
them on without rest to some spot far removed from 
danger. Let the earthquake throw down a few houses, 
and rend open the hills or valleys, and terror takes hold 
on man. He looks up and down and around and cries 
for help. His knees tremble under him, and his face 
grows pallid. The one desire for preservation from 
uncertain and irresistible woe absorbs everything. 
Nothing is cared for but safety. If we would see this 
emotion riding on the whirlwind let us look upon a large 



Fear. 1 79 

army, seized with a panic, rushing from the field of 
battle. Obstruct their retreat with streams and rocks 
and fallen trees, and line their only outlet with a 
merciless foe, whose weapons make terrible havoc, 
increasing at every step the obstacles to be surmounted 
in the way of escape, and you may then see the mad- 
ness, wrestling, desperation, and grim death that attend 
the movements of this emotion grown frantic. 

Invisible evils are not less the objects of dread. Man 
cannot shake off the supernatural. He believes and 
feels that there are invisible beings above him who may 
do him much harm. He has ever stood in awe of them. 
He has lacerated himself and even sacrificed his life to 
please them in subjection to his fears. His superstition 
has given birth to his fears, and is itself the offspring of 
guilt and ignorance. Man has been much more under 
dread of the devil than under fear of God. Satan 
succeeded, under various forms of idolatry, in binding 
the human race in abject subjection to himself. Love 
he never pretended to inspire. He ruled by terror. 
And to appease his wrath, poor mortal man, under the 
impulse of fear, sacrificed hecatombs of human victims. 
When calamities came by flood, or fire, or war, men 
trembled because they supposed that he was angry, and 
under the direction of his priests submitted to the 
greatest humiliation and sacrifice. 

The fear of the one true God was limited to those to 
whom he was revealed. Moses trembled on hearing 
his voice on Sinai, David when he experienced his 
wrath in a destructive plague, Isaiah when he saw his 
glory, Daniel when he came near and spoke to him, 
Job when he beheld his holiness, and Saul of Tarsus 
when he saw and heard the glorified Immanuel. The 



180 Christian Psychology : 

emotion of fear occasioned by beholding the glory of 
Jehovah, or hearing his voice, is very distinct from that 
religious habit called the fear of the Lord. The first 
may be and will be experienced by those who are the 
enemies of God, as on the day of judgment, when awful 
terror shall seize the whole company of the condemned 
from the display of his majesty as a God of vengeance ; 
the latter is of the very essence of piety. This latter 
fear is an habitual respect and reverence for his 
presence, character, and authority, though unseen, and 
springs from a perception of his excellencies and claims, 
and the natural emotion of fear of incurring his dis- 
pleasure by disregarding his holy will. 

The inferior animals are very susceptible of this 
feeling. Their Creator has implanted the fear of man 
within them. How fearful the hare, the fox, or the 
deer of the approach of man as a hunter ! The water- 
fowl often molested will not allow the sportsman to 
come near before they have fled to a safer retreat. 
Even the fishes of the sea start on the first glimpse of 
his approach. Animals that move in flocks or herds, 
as sheep and buffaloes, may be seized with panics under 
the power of which they destroy themselves in great 
numbers. 

Fear may be ranked among the most useful emotions. 
Designed by our Maker to aid in securing the safety of 
man from coming evil, it often effectually subserves its 
purpose. It aids in preserving from physical suffering, 
from social degradation, from pecuniary loss, from moral 
corruption, and from spiritual woe. See the miner hurry 
away from the expected blast, and just in time to escape 
a shower of stones. See the mariner rush under shelter, 
and hold fast, when the tremendous billow is about to 



Fear. 181 

strike his tempest-tossed vessel, and not too soon, as the 
wave would have swept him overboard as a feather. 
And see a fugitive family in the woods, hurrying from 
the forest on fire; every moment the flames are approach- 
ing ; their roaring is heard ; the wild beasts are rushing 
past them ; every sight and sound betokens danger, and 
quickens to fever heat this powerful emotion, which now 
commands every energy of the being. Fear of exposure, 
as fraudulent or dishonest, deters from making a false 
entry or uttering a misstatement. The emotion comes to 
the help of the judgment, and lays an arrest on the hand 
and on the lip. The embarrassments of poverty rise up 
before the mind of the squanderer as his funos are 
becoming low, and fear puts a break on the wheels to 
prevent Jhe train from plunging into the bog of distress. 
When evil habits are getting the upper hand, and clearly 
leading the soul into the den of sensuality, it sometimes, 
by a favouring providence, gets a sight of the interior, 
either by the entrance or escape of some prisoner, when 
it starts back with horror, and asks, " Whither am I 
going ? " The vision remains, for fear keeps the eyes 
open ; and now -the words of the wise man are fulfilled, 
" In vain is the net spread in the sight of any bird;" 
he will not willingly go forward ; he must be dragged as 
the most reluctant of prisoners into his cell ; fear all the 
while holding him back ; or perchance he bursts away 
from his fetters, and refuses to stay for a moment in the 
midst of dangers so alarming. 

In a marked manner is the beneficial working of this 
emotion seen when men are deterred from exposing 
themselves to the vengeance of the Almighty as a just 
God. Truly the fear of the Lord is the beginning of 
wisdom. A sight of his majesty may well evoke fear in 



1 82 Christian Psychology : 

the hardest heart, and so arrest the most daring trans- 
gressor. If fear is ever to move the human soul, it 
cannot have a more becoming field than when the 
threatening wrath of Jehovah crosses the sinner's path. 
Let it now lay its arresting power to stop a further 
approach to the unquenchable fire; and let it clothe the 
feet with wings in their speed to a place of safety. When 
it arrests, the evil is supposed to be in front; and when 
it quickens the pace, the evil is supposed to be pursuing 
from behind. In the sinner's case, dangers seem to 
surround him, all refuge fails him, and perplexity, as 
when one is lost, seizes him. " What must I do to be 
savear " is wrung from the depths of his soul, as fear 
takes full possession. Happy is he who is then 
enabled to perceive one narrow avenue open to a mercy 
seat ; and with a speed and earnestness equal to the 
emergency, presses his way thither, and casts himself 
down before it. 

There is a species of fear which partakes of the nature 
of a disease. It is called groundless, as there is no visible 
object or definite conception to call it forth. But it 
is not groundless. It has a material origin in the 
stomach, and more directly in the brain. Food 
remains undigested ; the brain is, as a consequence, 
clouded and oppressed ; and nature is telling her com- 
plaint in broken murmurs at the ear of judgment. The 
dimness of the perception is aided by the quicker 
sensibilities of the soul. The warning is given ; let it 
not be unheeded. Take care of the mind by taking care 
of the brain ; and take care of the brain by taking care 
of the stomach. Thus fear, by her uneasiness and 
distress, may lay a timely arrest on the loss of bodily 
and mental vigour. 



Depression, 183 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

13,— viii. DEPRESSION. 

The last of the emotions which we have classified as 
" Disagreeable," is Depression. The condition so com- 
monly referred to by the expression, " depression of 
spirits " cannot be overlooked by the psychologist. If 
regarded as an emotion, its claim to the class of the 
" Disagreeable " will not be questioned. It may be 
asked, — Is it an emotion ? The question may be 
answered by defining what an emotion is. Is it simply 
the soul in a state or condition of feeling ? If so, beyond 
a doubt depression is an emotion, for it is a very clearly 
marked condition of feeling. The soul is in a state of 
very impressive feeling. But if an emotion is defined 
as the soul in a state of motive feeling, that is, of feeling 
moving or inciting to action, as distinguished from what 
might be considered as a mere passive state of feeling, 
depression may still claim a place among the emotions. 
Like other emotions of this class, as shame, grief, and 
fear, in certain stages its direct influence is repression 
of action ; yet it has a motive influence proper to itself, 
operating in a double manner, retarding or terminating 
actions now felt to be unwise or hopeless, and directly 
moulding the features of the countenance, giving tone to 
the utterance of the voice, and shaping the sentences of 
the p n. 



184 Christian Psychology : 

Few emotions are more common than this in its lesser 
stages of development. It pervades all classes, and 
appears in every department of labour. It betrays its 
power in the countenance of the boy who has lost a game 
of marbles, and of the general who has been defeated with 
an army of one hundred thousand men. After assuming 
the simple form of discouragement, it passes succes- 
sively into dejection, depression, despondency, and 
despair. 

Its progress may be illustrated. An only son has 
returned from a voyage for his health no better than 
when he left home. This information produced dis- 
couragement in the fondly-loving parent's heart. A few 
days after his return he is seized with a fresh attack of 
disease. By this the parent is cast down, he is in truth 
dejected. The remedies resorted to have not been 
successful in raising him up, and depression of spirits 
becomes clearly marked on the countenance of the 
anxious parent. The truth cannot longer be con- 
cealed, the disease is making rapid progress, and 
the son is sinking. Painful despondency weighs 
down the parent's heart. Every device that might 
ward off the cold hand of death from the sufferer is tried 
— but all in vain ; insensibility supervenes on entire 
prostration, and now the gloom of despair settles down 
on all the attendants and crushes the spirit of the 
agonized father to the earth. Or take an illustration of 
another class of recent occurrence. A vessel sailing 
from Newcastle to New Zealand with coal foundered 
in Foveaux Straits. Head winds greatly retarded the 
ship during most of the voyage, by which the captain 
and crew were doubtless discouraged. On reaching the 
West Cape of the South Island, one of the most stormy 



Depression. 185 

regions on the face of the globe, they were met by a 
heavy south-east gale which dejected all on board. 
The gale continued to increase in violence with its usual 
accompaniment a raging sea, and the vessel, the Hydra, 
sprang a leak. Depression was then felt by every soul 
in the tempest-tossed bark. The pumps were set agoing, 
but the water came in faster than it could be put out. 
Despondency began to prevail. But the skilful captain 
and hardworking crew connect an engine with their 
pumps, and they are barely able to keep the water in 
check. The strain is unusual for the engine, and should 
it break down all hope of saving the ship is gone. A 
few hours' pressure breaks the machinery, and now 
despondency gives way to despair of keeping their 
vessel afloat. They cannot save the ship. They betake 
themselves to the boats and are picked up by a passing 
vessel. In both these cases the climax of despair is 
relative not absolute. The father despairs of saving 
his son and ceases to try any further means ; the captain 
and crew despair of keeping their ship afloat and cease 
all further effort in that direction. But neither the one 
nor the other resign themselves to utter inaction ; other 
duties must engage the father's attention ; and the 
possibility of saving their own lives prompts the captain 
and crew to immediate and appropriate action, which 
through the favouring providence of God proved 
successful. 

The operation of each grade of the emotion may be 
separately traced. Discouragement generally follows a 
want of success in any engagement or occupation. The 
hunter will not go and come day after day empty-handed 
without feeling discouraged. And so with the miner 
and the fisher. If the precious metal cannot be reached 

M 



1 86 Christian Psychology : 

after shafts have been sunk in various quarters, and if 
no fish can be seen after repeated efforts, this emotion 
begins to assert its place, and lay a restraint upon a 
further expenditure of time and means on what appears 
unprofitable and vain. When the failure is on an 
extensive scale and after indulging high expectations, 
dejection will show its presence in countenance and act. 
The farmer has had an extensive area sown ; the grain 
has made its appearance in a most promising state ; 
favourable weather has advanced it almost to maturity ; 
but now the turn of fortune comes ; the rain descends in 
torrents for days, the rivers rise and overflow, and the 
vast fields of grain, once so promising, are deluged and 
destroyed, and all hope of a remunerative harvest is 
swept away. Can that farmer walk over these mud- 
besmeared and water- wasted fields without a stock of 
grain erect, and not feel dejected from his heavy disap- 
pointment ? Repeated failures on an extensive scale, 
attended with loss of reputation, will produce depression. 
We know what repeated failures in mercantile transac- 
tions have produced on sensitive minds. Hardened 
dishonesty can alone withstand the depression. Honour- 
able men have borne the traces of this mental burden 
for the rest of their days. When the losses have been 
such as come home to the heart of a nation ; when one 
defeat after another has been suffered on the field of 
battle ; when the slaughter has been heart-rending ; 
when the circumstances indicate to the eye of the public 
cowardice or want of capacity on the part of the general 
so often and so disastrously beaten ; when the crowning 
act of the foe is to capture the unfortunate leader and 
the remains of his army — what must be the feelings of 
that general, surrounded by a few dejected fellow- 



Depression. 187 

captives, when the condemnation and reproaches of 
tens of thousands of Iris countrymen, now prostrate 
under the feet of the conqueror, reach him in his 
retreat ? What were the feelings of Napoleon the First 
on returning to Paris after the battle of Waterloo ? 
And what emotion held supreme sway over the spirit of 
Napoleon the Third when a captive in Germany after 
the battle of Sedan ? May it not be said that dis- 
couragement, dejection, depression stamped the spirit 
and countenance alike of uncle and nephew. We 
rejoice in the humiliation of no fellow-mortal, except 
so far as that humiliation is a victory of enlightenment, 
liberty, or righteousness. On the distinguished men to 
whom we have referred we are not called upon to pro- 
nounce judgment ; their known mental state, after the 
signal defeats which were conclusive as to their fate, 
has simply furnished us with an appropriate illustration 
of deep depression. 

Severe and repeated bereavements sometimes lead to 
this state. In such circumstances the emotion is 
generally blended with grief. They are distinct but 
kindred emotions. Depression with grief may exist in 
the soul of the captain who has been defeated with the 
loss of many brave men. Grief without depression of 
soul may touch the heart of the victorious captain 
because he has lost some highly-prized officers. The 
victory precludes depression ; but the loss of brave men 
familiarly known afflicts with grief. We do not say 
that the soul is elated at the moment of grief. It cannot 
be, for grief inevitably weighs down. But at the time 
of victory the soul is elated ; and the subsequent 
thoughts of loss or sights of pain check that elation, 
and bring down the feelings ; but the assurance of 



1 88 Christian Psychology : 

victory acts now as an equipoise and prevents the soul 
from sinking. Hence the natural influence of grief is 
felt ; and yet the soul upborne by victory is prevented 
from coming within the domain of this emotion. It 
will be readily admitted that depression may often exist 
without grief distinctively so called. It is often, how- 
ever, the result of excessive grief. If sorrow is protracted 
the spirit assumes a downward bent, as a branch of a 
tree to which a weight has been attached for some time, 
it will not return at once to its upright position but may 
retain perpetually the bent of its burden ; so the spirit 
is said to be broken, meaning by such an expression, 
greatly depressed. If not relieved within a limited 
time the emotion passes into a state properly so called, 
and the person becomes melancholy. Against this habit 
or state the human spirit struggles manfully. The good 
Creator has endowed it with a large measure of 
buoyancy or elasticity which enables it after a time to 
emerge out of deep waters and to resume with wonted 
spirit its old toil. 

To despondency we assign an advanced grade of this 
emotion. This will be readily admitted. Men may be 
discouraged and yet not despond. They may be even 
dejected or depressed, and yet not reach the stage of 
despondency. But add to the depressed mind the 
burden of several failures to ameliorate the condition, 
and feelings of despondency will force themselves upon 
the soul. Struggle as it may, it will in most cases 
begin to despond. Despondency is not despair. In 
despair hope has ceased to operate on a limited or 
unlimited sphere. In despondency hope still keeps a 
foothold, and is reluctant to lose it. Many ways may 
appear blocked up, but it conceives that one still 



Depi csswii. 189 

remains open and affords a way of escape could it only 
be found. Take the case of a man suffering from illness. 
He may be discouraged or even depressed by it, but he 
does not at once despond, unless the disease is of a 
peculiar character, or some presentiment of death has 
taken possession of him. It is when a variety of means 
have been tried, one after another, with fair intervals 
between to give time for the examination of results, that 
despondency puts in an appearance in countenance and 
speech. In this mood the soul is very unsettled. At 
one time it is on the very verge of despair, and again 
hope has mounted the throne, and cast a gleam of 
cheerfulness over the face. The case of the patriarch 
Job affords a striking illustration. He was at first 
simply dejected by sore bereavements. But personal 
affliction brought him into a state of depression ; and 
this continuing without prospect of recovery, he falls at 
times into deep despondency, — he wishes that he had 
not been born, he complains bitterly, and expresses a 
desire to die rather than drag out such a miserable 
existence ; yet these are his worst moods ; he does not 
relinquish his hope in God, but declares that though He 
should slay him he would not abandon his trust in 
Him. Hence despair is not allowed to take possession, 
though fits of despondency bring him to its very doors, 
and extract expressions which may be pardoned but not 
justified. 

The last stage of depression is despair. The soul 
can sink no lower. This feeling may be limited or 
absolute. When limited it respects some person for 
whom while hope remained efforts were made, but 
when despair received possession of the soul it stopped 
all further trouble, or some particular line of operation 



190 Christian Psydwlogy : 

on which it terminates all effort. Thus a man des- 
pairing of finding his way through the woods after 
several fruitless attempts, because night has come down 
upon him, ceases all further search, and lies down to 
wait for the dawn. Or a man despairing of reforming 
a profligate son from his vicious habits, ma3^ after much 
heartbreaking for the failures of every conceivable 
means of reclaiming him, give up the task as wholly 
vain. When despair is absolute, the man either sur- 
renders himself to his fate without a struggle, or throws 
himself away. A man may die like Caesar. After 
bravely defending himself while there was hope, he may 
cover his face with his mantle and meet his doom. 
Those who have no means of escape from a sinking 
ship may calmly await the moment when she takes the 
fatal plunge, if all fear of death has been swallowed up. 
But generally distress is so great that cries are heard, 
as from a man surrounded by flames or drowning, such 
as despair alone can wring out. Men sometimes throw 
themselves away under the influence of this emotion. 
We speak not of cases of disordered brain where disease 
has been at work, but of that crushing depression of 
spirits which forces hope out of every resting-place in 
the soul, and drives the soul to seek refuge from its 
burden in the arms of death. Such are ever to be 
pitied. As we would rescue our fellow-man from a 
material burden which was crushing his frame, so 
should we strive to relieve the poor burdened spirit of 
man from a feeling which was crushing him as the boa 
constrictor the harmless buffalo. Let us avoid what 
would cause this depression. Let us cultivate a cheerful 
and hopeful spirit. And to gain reason and conscience 
to our side, let us avoid such moral evils as blast all 



Depression. 191 

hope of the divine favour. Doing what is right ; seeking 
to benefit man and to glorify God in all our ways; let us 
bear up under all trials and discouragements, preparing 
and looking for a better world where the human spirit 
shall never renew its acquaintance with disagreeable 
emotions. 



192 Christian Psychology : 



DIVISION III. 



INDEFINITE EMOTIONS. 
CHAPTER XXV. 

14.— 1. SYMPATHY. 

By Indefinite Emotions we understand those which 
cannot be definitely classified with either the Agreeable 
or Disagreeable. They are few in number. Some of 
these have a marked tendency to pass into the Agreeable 
or Disagreeable ; as the soul strongly moved readily 
assumes a palpable element of pleasure or pain. But 
their individuality or separate existence may be dis- 
tinctly traced anterior to the assumption of the 
pleasurable or painful element. Others, as Wonder 
and Zeal, may be so absorbing or self-contained as 
scarcely to suffer any other emotion of the soul to 
impinge upon them during their current existence. If 
prolonged, however, some other emotion will generally 
arise, blend its influence with the preceding, and 
modify its power; it may be, rise to paramount authority 
and extinguish the existence of the former by wholly 
supplanting it. 

Sympathy. — We have given this emotion the first 
place among the Indefinite. It is entitled to it as 
peculiarly indefinite. It bears a general character ; to- 
day linked with joy ; to-morrow blended with sorrow ; 



Sympathy. 193 

and the third day rising in the amazement of the 
wondering without an element of either joy or sorrow. 
Under a partial investigation it may appear as if one of 
the agreeable or disagreeable emotions with a new name. 
But it is clearly distinguishable from the simply plea- 
surable or painful in more ways than one. It is always 
a feeling with some other animate being, rational or 
irrational ; whereas a simple agreeable or disagreeable 
emotion may arise from a personal sensation or a con- 
sideration of the individual's own state without the 
smallest reference to another. But its claim to a classi- 
fication distinct from the two preceding general divisions 
will be conceded when we consider that it rises with 
emotions or blends with feelings, that have as yet no 
sensible element of pleasure or pain ; as the soul stand- 
ing in a state of expectant wonder, or putting forth its 
ardour without thought or sense of the pleasing or the dis- 
pleasing. Thus the soul may be thrown into great excite- 
ment, in other words, be moved with very strong general 
sympathy, as in a crowded enthusiastic meeting, without 
any well-defined emotion preponderating ; the man being 
simply under the influence of an indefinite sympathetic 
zeal. Hence sympathy is pre-eminently indefinite, as 
the most general of all the emotions, being the suscep- 
tibility of the soul to assume or imitate almost every 
emotion under which another sentient being is seen or 
thought to move. 

' There is one species of sympathy which properly 
belongs to physiology. It is that in which one part 
of the body being affected, another part is felt to be 
similarly affected by reason of some nervous connection 
with it. The brain and stomach are known in this sense 
to sympathise very strongly with each other. A heated 



194 Christian Psychology : 

head will immediately affect the digestive process in 
operation in the stomach. On the other hand, a warm 
draught taken into the stomach will almost immediately 
be felt on the brain. It is said that an ulcer on the 
brain will produce vomiting. A blow on the head by a 
fall certainly may. A very cold drink will at times pro- 
duce an acute pain over the eyebrow ; distension of the 
stomach will produce heart-burn ; and indigestion will 
occasion a pain beneath the breast bone. To these many 
additional illustrations might be added. 

Another species of sympathy belongs both to phy- 
siology and psychology. Ordinary illustrations of this 
kind are seen in sympathetic yawning, laughing, and 
fits. The marked nervous action in these cases brings 
the phenomena properly under the cognizance of the 
physiologist. While the emotion to which the soul has 
been subject, in the production of the nervous action 
calls for the investigation of the psychologist. It is very 
common to see the yawning of one person in a circle 
followed by a general yawning, at short intervals, all 
round. How is this ? The yawning of all except the 
first, seems to be, partially at least, involuntary. One 
has apparently relieved his lungs by a prolonged ex- 
piration, and the act has suggested to those who have 
seen the wide-extended mouth, or heard the familiar 
sound attending yawning, the propriety of a similar act 
of relief. The act occurs during dullness, drowsiness, or 
fatigue. It is an effort of nature to relieve itself, and its 
repetition by others present is due to the involuntary 
sympathetic susceptibility of the soul. Something similar 
occurs under the influence of excessive laughter. It is 
well known that if two or three children of a group begin 
to laugh persistentjy, others will join them in the exer- 



Sympathy. 195 

cise — unless restrained by strong" considerations opposed 
to the conception of anything laughable — until the whole 
company are convulsed. And of these there maybe some 
who, if interrogated, will reply that they are unable to 
say at what they are laughing. In simple truth, they 
laugh because others laugh. But the psychologist, 
anxious to penetrate beneath the surface, presses his 
investigation. And what is the result ? He can only 
extract from nature the repeated response — "I sym- 
pathise — I sympathise in feeling, and my nervous system 
responds to the demand of my emotion." In some 
homely phrases there is true philosophy. The expression 
" laughing is catching," is one of these; for a listener 
who is not a spectator may actually "catch" the 
emotion, and join in the laughter, although a partition 
separates the parties. By some this may be attributed 
to suggestion. Doubtless the intellect is often, in such 
cases, in active exercise ; but laughter is the result of 
emotion, and this emotion is known to occur without 
any conscious mental exercise to produce it. Still we 
may not exclude all intellectual exercise, for emotion 
itself is the fruit of sensation or conception, recognised 
or unrecognised ; and swift intellectual apprehensions of 
some sort must precede these outbursts of jubilation. 
The sight of one falling in a fit has been known to pro- 
duce a similar effect in others. For example, a woman 
falling in an hysterical fit, in a crowded and excited 
meeting, has similarly affected several others. The 
emotion of one has been caught by others. In each case 
the emotion has been preceded more or less rapidly by 
intellectual apprehensions of some sort. The sensation 
has led to the apprehension, the apprehension to the 
emotion, and the emotion to the prostration ; but in the 



196 Christian Psychology : 

immediate antecedent to the fit, the soul showed its 
striking susceptibility to catch the feeling by which 
others are impelled ; in other words, to sympathise. 

The sympathy which properly belongs to psychology 
is the prompt assumption of the feeling which is seen or 
conceived to move others whether attended or not by ner- 
vous action or energetic effort. Illustrations crowd upon 
us. Sorrow is to us, as a race, most familiar. We enter a 
room, in which is a coffin containing the mortal remains 
of one dear to those in the house. The coffin is about to 
be closed, and the relatives gather round to take a last 
look. Tears flow profusely. You are no relation of the 
deceased, but your heart is subdued and saddened by the 
sight ; you sympathise, and may feel your own eyes suf- 
fused with tears, without any wish on your part. If we 
open the wondrous historical book from which we have 
so often drawn our illustrations, we gather some touch- 
ing cases. A princess was walking on the margin of the 
famous old Nile, when her eye was arrested by the sight 
of a cradle of bulrushes floating on the edge of the river. 
It was brought to her, and she opened it, and saw a babe 
of wondrous beauty. The strange sight startled the 
infant, and he wept. His tears penetrated the heart of 
the lady — the sorrow of his infant breast awoke a sym- 
pathy in her womanly nature, and he was saved. He 
who possessed a perfect humanity was once surrounded 
by a group of mourners. The bereaved wept, and their 
friends wept. Could he remain unmoved ? — Impossible. 
He groaned in spirit, and forthwith the tears of sympathy 
rolled down his cheeks. The foresight of coming woe 
had the same effect upon his benevolent nature. He saw 
the streets of Jerusalem strewn with the slain, he beheld 
the wretched remnant reduced to the greatest straits of 



Sympathy. 197 

poverty, disease, and woe ; the sight might melt a heart 
of iron. He saw it as present, and the sympathy of grief 
caused him to weep over the doomed city. 

So with joy. The joy of the bridegroom is proverbial. 
But his joy is shared by another. The friend of the 
bridegroom rejoiceth because of the bridegroom's voice ; 
the unselfish, true-hearted friend glows with delight 
because another is delighted. The parables of the lost 
sheep, lost money, and lost son exhibit the joy of 
recovery, as extended to many beyond the immediate 
owners. When, a short time ago, the heir apparent to 
the throne of our empire was raised up from the gates of 
death, the heart of the mother — the widowed queen — was 
made glad. But she was not alone in her joy. Her hap- 
piness struck a sympathetic chord in many hearts in her 
empire, and addresses of congratulation poured in from 
all quarters. What are congratulations for successes, 
honours, victories, and deliverances, when sincere and 
without respect to any personal advantages, but the out- 
goings of joyful sympathy? Humanity is not alone in 
its sympathies. The triumphs of the church on earth 
evoke the loudest jubilations in the heavenly mansions. 
The rejoicings here are caught up, and re-echoed over 
the wide plains of the celestial paradise. The events 
themselves, as distinguished from the persons specially 
interested, might occasion great joy; but the two families 
are one in Christ, and the triumph of the one is the 
rejoicing of the other. 

In fear the power of sympathy is most marked. A 
few timorous minds will make the hearts of many to 
fear. Hence the judicious order given of old before 
going into battle, requiring every faint-hearted man to 
leave the ranks and return home, lest his timidity should 



198 Christian Psychology : 

infect others. The flight of a few disheartens many, 
and suggests the propriety of a retreat. When a panic 
takes possession of a portion of an army, the emotion of 
terror may spread with amazing rapidity, and irresistibly 
control those who know no reason for their fear or 
flight. Imagination has taken the place of accurate 
perception. They have suddenly conceived some terrible 
impending woe, and the emotion of fear becomes over- 
powering. The emotion exhibited in its fruits in some 
has, by this law of sympathy, evoked a similar feeling in 
others with corresponding results. Similar effects are 
seen from an alarm of fire, or earthquake, or the giving 
way of a portion of a building in a crowded house. 
The emotion, naturally produced in the minds of all 
who understand the alarm, is increased much by the 
exhibition of the same feeling in many others. It must 
be so, as some are seen to quake from fear who have 
not heard the alarm, and are unable to say from what 
cause the terror has arisen. They have seen others 
trembling, and the emotion of dread has taken possession 
of them. 

See a crowd assembling from various parts of a city 
because of some unlooked for event. A criminal may 
have been arrested and is striving to escape ; a carriage 
may have been overturned and its occupants thrown 
out and injured ; or a man may have fallen down in 
the street and lies apparently dead. The result is the 
same whatever may have been the nature of the event. 
A crowd assembles with wonderful rapidity. One leaves 
his store, another drops his tools, a third and fourth 
run from their houses, and it may be nine-tenths do not 
know what has occurred till they reach the spot. They 
have seen others making haste to a certain spot ; they 



Sympathy. 199 

have observed that from all quarters that place is the 
point of convergence. It is enough ; they must run and 
see what is the matter. The emotion of wonder evoked 
in one or two has spread in all directions and seized on 
the crowd, although when assembled the greater part, 
like the mob at Ephesus, know not why they have come 
together. 

We speak of the sympathy of numbers. What is it ? 
It is the emotional glow diffused from spirit to spirit 
and re-acting on its various sources. The feeling has 
spread from soul to soul, until it has become a common 
possession, and its combined power increases the emo- 
tion in each individual beyond what it would have 
experienced from the originating cause if detached from 
the multitude. The united flame from many branches 
causes each to burn more fiercely, and kindles some 
that would not burn without this general flame. In 
this way many rush into battle, swarm up the ascent to 
the fort, and leap into the midst of destruction, their 
courage being kept aglow from the fire of a diffused and 
reacting emotion rather than from any individual con- 
siderations of duty. Some are more susceptible than 
others ; they are heroes ; they will lead others into the 
fight ; and a body of them will perform prodigies of 
valour. On the same principle we explain the interest 
felt by a speaker and by the audience in a crowded 
assembly. Many have risen to distinction in the world 
by the display of abilities drawn out by the multitude, 
who, by a variety of circumstances, have been induced 
to come and hear. The speaker is aroused by the sight 
of so many waiting upon him ; if he has ability it must 
now come to the surface ; anything at all fitted to 
impress moves some in the audience, specially if pre- 



200 Christian Psychology : 

disposed to receive a favourable impression ; these 
being moved, by this law of sympathy, affect others ; 
the interest proves infectious ; the audience is in a state 
of impressible expectancy ; a sentence, even a word, 
moves them, for the speaker is, as some would express 
it, en rapport with his hearers ; they act and react on 
each other until speaking becomes a pleasure and 
hearing a delight. 

The operation of this emotion is not limited to the 
human species. It is extended to the brute creation by 
man ; and it is shown by the inferior creation towards 
man. We sympathise in the alarm felt by the mother- 
bird in her endeavours to gather her scattered brood 
under cover from the hovering hawk about to pounce 
down upon them. We share in the sadness of the cat 
going mournfully round in search of her kittens that 
have been stealthily carried off and drowned. We are 
pained with the dog whose sides have been laid bare by 
the paws of the kangaroo. And we are gladdened by 
the frolicsome gambols of the lambs on the grassy 
lawn. And on the other hand, the noble horse is known 
to sympathise with the zeal of his master in the chase. 
He understands his task, and in his ardour equals, if 
not outstrips, his rider. The faithful dog pines and 
moans when he sees his master in trouble, will instinc- 
tively seek his relief, and when dead will howl over his 
grave. 

This susceptibility of feeling indicates a designed 
adaptation to society. Sympathy naturally developes the 
emotion in the original subject of it, increasing the anger, 
hatred, fear, and sorrow, as well as the gratitude, love, 
joy, and hope. But sometimes sympathy, with suffering, 
is seen to diminish the grief — not as a direct result of 



SympatJiy. 201 

blending sorrow with sorrow, but from attendant con- 
siderations of comfort, aid, and support, under the pre- 
sent distress. Sympathy should be cultivated within 
certain limits. " Rejoice with them that rejoice, and 
weep with them that weep." A contrary disposition is 
the exponent of selfishness. But all emotions require to 
be under restraint. Excess is weakness, often loss, and 
sometimes death. A due development of emotional 
sympathy reveals a thoughtful mind and a well-regulated 
heart. And a wise selection of the objects of sympathy 
reveals an enlightened conscience and a noble nature. 



202 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

15.— ii. WONDER, 

This is a feeling of surprise, astonishment, or amaze- 
ment in seeing, hearing, or imagining anything unusual, 
strange, startling, or extraordinary. Under its influence 
the soul lifts itself to a state of vigilant expectation, or 
holds itself in anxious suspense, as if to watch or guard 
against the next movement or change. The wonder may 
subside or pass away, on the object apprehended or con- 
ceived or the sound heard losing its strangeness, and 
becoming recognised as natural or ordinary; or it may pass 
into another emotion, as that of joy on the apprehension of 
something conceived to be desirable, or that of terror, on 
the discovery of something truly alarming. Phenomena 
of providence, monstrosities of nature, curiosities of 
art, singular and strange personal appearances and 
sounds, all excite wonder in some of its stages. The 
eclipse of sun or moon, total or partial, is seldom wit- 
nessed without the emotion of wonder. In times of 
ignorance the emotion speedily passed into terror ; but 
now it rests in wonder or amazement. When comets 
appear night after night in the sky, with their long 
trailing appendage, curiosity is evoked while men gaze 
with astonishment. The brilliant flickerings and nimble 
dancings of the electric lights which constitute the 
auroras of the poles often attract attention, specially 
when brightly coloured, and never fail to call forth this 



/ 1 r onder. 203 

emotion in some form. The astronomer, whose business 
it is to survey the glories of the heavens, must often be 
subject to this feeling, if favoured with a glass of unusual 
power. 

Nature presents to us some unusual sights from 
time to time. They are designated " monsters," what- 
ever may be the size. The giant and the dwarf are alike 
wonders. An unusual development, as a double head on 
one neck, six fingers or toes instead of the ordinary 
number, five feet instead of four, belongs to the same 
class. The surprise is felt to be greater when the charac- 
teristics of two natures are seen blended in one. Inani- 
mate marvels are not less attractive. The seven wonders of 
the world, viz., the pyramids, the Artemisian mausoleum, 
the Ephesian temple of Diana, the hanging gardens of 
Babylon, the colossus at Rhodes, the statue of Jupiter 
Olympius, and the pharos of Alexandria, in days of old, 
aroused this emotion in no common manner. And what 
traveller can gaze for the first time on the first of these 
on the plains of Egypt, without standing almost bewil- 
dered in amazement. Colossal structures of modern art 
may claim a place beside some at least of these. Who 
can look upon the Great Eastern steamship, in all her 
magnificence, grandeur, and extent, for the first time, 
without wonder ? And who can pass through or under 
the great iron tubular bridge across the river St. Law- 
rence — nearly two miles in width, raised on granite 
piers sixty-eight feet above the water, and. sunk in a 
stream twenty-five feet deep, and in a current running 
five miles an hour — without a similar feeling strongly 
developed ? What is surprisingly beautiful or exquisitely 
finished calls forth astonishment, mingled with delight or 
approbation. 



204 Christian Psychology : 

How often is this emotion excited in the heart of the 
traveller or explorer ! Who could traverse the wilds of 
Africa with Livingstone, or Baker, or Speke ; who could 
explore the most remote regions with Humboldt or 
Hooker; who could penetrate the frozen regions of the 
north with Ross or Parry, with Hall or Kane, without 
often dwelling in amazement at unwonted sights ? The 
wanderer in the valleys of California comes upon a 
gigantic forest. Far above his head, towering up to 
three hundred feet, with a girth of thirty, sixty, or ninety 
feet, stands before him the " Wellingtonia." Is he not 
surprised ? He looks up, he walks round, he takes his 
stand at various points of observation, and everywhere 
one emotion overpowers all others. He beholds a tree 
that has grown for three, it may be, four thousand years. 

The Canadian visitor steps out of a railway carriage at 
the suspension bridge of the Niagara River. A deep 
rumbling sound fills his ears. His mind is held in sus- 
pense. He pursues his way west from the station for 
less than a mile, the roar of waters growing louder as he 
advances, when the world-renowned falls burst upon his 
entranced vision. His wonder has not yet risen to its 
height. He looked, it may be, for waters rushing from 
above him, but he sees a mighty river falling from beside 
him into a deep cavity or gorge. Let him descend the 
zigzag path, and take his stand in front of the falls, and 
there let him feast his eyes on one of the grandest sights 
on our planet, and dull indeed must be his nature if his 
soul does not respond to the loud call of nature and rise 
to wonder, and then to adoration of Him who caused 
this stream to flow with such stupendous force and 
grandeur. But we need not travel from home. Seasons 
seldom pass without this emotion in some form assuming 



Wonder. 205 

temporary possession of the soul. A stranger is ushered 
into our room. There is something unusual in his 
appearance. A retrospective glance on the stored-up 
impressions of past years discovers something very like 
the man who now stands before us. This emotion comes 
now into full play, but rises with increasing power from 
the moment that the singularity struck us, and aids the 
intellect in its explorations by quickening its energy. At 
length the wonder passes into the higher grade of 
astonishment, when we are able to name as an old and 
dear friend of former years the unexpected visitor who 
has called upon us. We break out with such expres- 
sions of wonder as — " I am surprised to see you here," 
or " Is it you ? " — as if some lingering doubt remained ; 
" How camej'OM here ? " 

Or lying awake in the silence of the night, a sound 
breaks on our ear as if of human moaning. The soul is 
hushed in suspense to hear with all acuteness. The 
moaning is repeated ; this emotion now takes full pos- 
session. Some one is suffering. Is the sound within 
the house, or is it from the street ? Careful listening 
determines its locality to be the street. Who is it ? 
Some homeless wanderer — some outcast victim of sin 
and shame ? We cannot rest — the emotion will not 
suffer sleep ; we must rise, and see who the sufferer is ; 
he may be a man of worth, who has been seized and 
robbed and wounded, and now is ready to expire from 
Want of human aid and sympathy. The search is made, 
and we are in time to afford much needed relief to an 
unfortunate but innocent fellow creature. 

Excited by the constructive faculty of the intellect, 
in the form of imagination, the soul may gaze with 
amazement on its own creation, or listen with breathless 



206 Christian Psychology : 

suspense for sounds which have no existence beyond the 
conceptions of the brain. In this way many of the 
spiritualists of the present day are the victims of their 
own delusion. They see and hear, as they conceive, the 
forms of beings, and the reports of their doings or move- 
ments, whereas the reality closely investigated shows 
that the whole transaction of sights and sounds is within 
their own brain. They have trifled with that wondrous 
but mysterious constitution of nerve and spirit with 
which we are endowed, and have disarranged the action 
of the one to the detriment of the other, and must pay 
the penalty of their folly in the annoying and dangerous 
troubles of a disordered brain. Have we not passed in 
boyhood the place said to be haunted, the old forsaken 
house where some crime had been committed, or the 
graveyard, the sleeping place of the dead, with the 
emotion of wonder rising at every creation of the intel- 
lect, and the emotion of fear rising as quickly beside it, 
until clearer .vision and the power of will dissolved the 
fancy and sent both emotions back to rest ; or until fear 
overpowering wonder, bore us off with quickened pace 
beyond the reach of the supposed danger, when a long 
expiration indicated the soul relief to which we had 
attained. 

The watchman who paces the streets during the 
midnight hours, and the look-out on the bow of the ship 
at sea in a much frequented region, have this faculty of 
the soul often called into exercise. The unusual sight 
or sound arrests the attention of the one, and the light 
or sail attracts the steady notice of the other, and in 
most cases the intellectual exercise is followed by some 
development of the emotion of wonder, it may be the 
extreme of amazement. 



Wonder. 207 

This faculty is easily excited and easily sustained, as 
it can co-exist with and derive nourishment from other 
emotions as love, joy, fear, and sorrow. How do the 
masses of the populace rush to shows, exhibitions, 
menageries, circuses, and theatres ? Something new, 
strange, extraordinary is to be seen or heard. The 
report excites the emotion, and there is an almost 
insatiable craving to have it gratified. Nor is it easily 
satisfied ; the promise of new sights will keep up the 
feeling, until the muscles of the frame, and the nerves 
of eyes and ears succumb with fatigue. On this faculty 
novelists trade very largely. To it they are indebted in 
no small measure for their popularity and wealth. The 
emotion is so easily excited, and so easily sustained, 
that men, and specially women, pore over books that 
feed this faculty. It becomes as a result unduly 
developed — the soul craves for the excitement, as the 
body for the stimulant of alcohol after it has for some 
time been addicted to its use ; and what is not fitted to 
arouse it is slighted as uninteresting, no matter how 
valuable and important the information may be. Who 
has not marked the interest with which a group of 
children will listen to the wonderful tale. If it is cut 
short, how disappointed they feel ; the request of all is 
— go on, tell us more about it. Sailors and soldiers 
that can relate the marvellous will not want for listeners ; 
and the more singular the event the deeper the atten- 
tion ; every disturbing sound being promptly suppressed 
that no syllable of the story may be lost. 

The design of this emotion is readily discernible. It 
is intended to arrest and sustain the attention to what 
is fitted to interest and instruct ; to fasten the sight on 
what is beautiful, magnificent, or glorious ; and to 



208 Christian Psychology : 

demand the notice of what may call for the most prompt 
and vigorous measures to render assistance or escape 
from danger. It is perverted when it is given over to 
the slavery of the silly and the ridiculous — or suffered 
to be chiefly occupied with vain, unprofitable, or immoral 
shows. It is seen in the noblest and highest exercise 
when securing attention to the many wonders of creation, 
providence, and grace. It served a high purpose when 
it arrested the attention of mortals to the miracles of 
Immanuel on earth, and it will find its loftiest develop- 
ment in heaven, in evoking the adorations of those who 
behold the ineffable glories of the uncreated God. 



Zeal. 209 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

16. — ill. ZEAL. 

The derivation of this term reveals the essential element 
of the emotion. It is taken from zelus, the Latin for 
zeal. The Latin is but the borrowed Greek fyXos, 
which in early days conveyed the idea of jealousy — as 
Hesiod Op. 193; Septuagint Num. xxv. 11, and Cant, 
viii. 6 ; but in later times expressed the clearly distinct 
idea of Zeal; Arist. Rhet. ii. 11, &c. In the New 
Testament the Greek term zelos is used to convey both 
ideas, as in Rom. x. 2, it is correctly translated zeal, 
and in 2 Cor. xi. 2, it is no less correctly translated 
jealousy. In one case at least, in our opinion, the word 
would have been better translated "jealousy" than 
" zeal," as in the well-known passage, " The zeal of thine 
house hath eaten me up," (John ii., 17 v.) being a quota- 
tion from Psalm lxix. 9 — as the idea involves something 
more than mere ardour in the cause of God, and 
corresponds to the feeling of the great prophet who, in 
his complaint to Jehovah, says, — " I have been very 
jealous for the Lord God of Hosts." In jealousy there 
is' a keen sense of wrong done or thought to be done to 
the person having this emotion, or to one whose cause 
he makes his own. And this was the case with Christ. 
It was jealousy for the honour of God, inflamed by the 
profanation of his house by traffickers in merchandise, 
that consumed him with its burning heat. The Greek 



210 Christian Psychology : 

noun X^Xoi is from the verb %eco, to " boil," and is akin 
to the Hebrew zidh or zndh, which is the same in sig- 
nification, and corresponds to our own old English word 
" seethe," — each of the three terms — zidh or zudh, zeo, 
and seethe — being onomatopoetic, and having a common 
origin. The idea of fervour, ardour, glowing heat, 
pervades each term, and this feeling is an essential 
element in both zeal and jealousy. But with the heat 
there is a distinguishing element. Heat characterizes 
several emotions, as anger, shame, jealousy, as well as 
zeal. But unlike jealousy there is necessarily no 
sense of wrong done or contemplated, and unlike 
shame, there may be no sense of guilt, and unlike 
anger there may be no sense of opposition to a sup- 
posed offender. Distinguished from all these, zeal 
stands out as the soul aroused and heated to action 
by the conception of an object deserving and demanding 
the utmost effort for its attainment. It is the act- 
inspiring, the deed-demanding emotion. It rests not 
without action ; it feeds upon it, flaming like the 
torch as it moves forward ; it dies without it. Spring- 
ing from deep conceptions, or firm graspings, — we 
do not say from profound apprehensions at all times, 
— of the importance of ideas to be promulgated and of 
exertions to be put forth, the soul is set aflame for 
action ; in other words, the soul under the influence of 
powerful conceptions, pointing to action as the path oi 
duty, becomes all aglow ; its ardour arouses its intel- 
lectual and physical powers, and the energy of the whole 
man is placed at the service of the will. Action in 
some direction must follow. The mind will work if the 
body cannot ; and both will be spent under the demands 
of this powerful influence. Action is the ordinary result 



Zeal. 2 1 1 

of all emotion. It may be but the dropping of the eyelids 
from shame ; or it may be the frantic rush to save life 
from the promptings of terror. One emotion often aids 
or conjoins its action with another. One is the principal 
for the time, the other is the assistant. See the ordinary 
motions of the body. When a person walks the muscles 
of his legs are mainly exercised, but many muscles of 
other portions of the body co-operate. If he stand still 
and exercise his arms, the muscles that had co-operated 
with the lower limbs in walking may now co-operate 
with the upper limbs in working. So it is with the 
soul. An agreeable or disagreeable emotion, as love or 
hatred, in the execution of its appropriate action, may 
secure to its aid this powerful emotion of zeal by 
directing the consideration of the mind to the vast 
importance of accomplishing the object aimed at. On 
the other hand, the soul heated to action by this emotion, 
may be aided and sustained in its efforts by other 
emotions, both agreeable and disagreeable, as hope and 
anger ; or it may be checked and retarded by purely 
disagreeable emotions, as grief and depression, rising 
and clinging, as it were, to its skirts, and refusing to be 
cast off. 

Let us see this emotion in action. Many of the 
noblest achievements accomplished on earth were per- 
formed under its impulse. See the ancient racer at the 
Olympic games. The honour of his country inspires 
him. The sight of the vast crowd excites him. The 
fame of the victor kindles the glow of ardour within 
him. The prize is the object of ambition — the goal is 
the point of attainment. He is restive for the signal to 
start. In an instant he bounds forward regardless of 
every object on either side, and intent on one thing with 



212 Christian Psychology :' 

all the energy which the mind in flame of excitement 
can furnish. That one thing is for the moment of pre- 
eminent importance, and it has secured by this fiery 
motive power all the physical capacity of the man. If 
he can, he must be victor by being first at the goal. Or 
see the modern boatman at the regatta. Weeks or 
months have been spent in training by the use of the 
oar in a chosen boat, and over a chosen course. But 
now the hour has arrived when the signal for starting 
shall be made. He has been anxious to keep cool, and 
reserve strength by calming the nervous system till the 
moment had come, but now that it has come, the 
draughts of the furnace are thrown open, every power 
that can excite has free scope, every thought that can 
kindle or sustain ardour is not simply welcomed but 
sought, and the power directed by skill, is kept up to 
the highest pitch of capacity by a burning zeal to be 
first in the race, and not to suffer a defeat. In this case 
sympathy adds her influence, and makes the crew in 
each boat a unit in respect to feeling and aim. 

Military enterprises offer a fine field for the display 
of this emotion. A man of known energy and activity 
is entrusted \vith the raising of an army to repel the 
invasion of his native land. All the powers of mind 
and body are brought out into full play. Five-sixths of 
every twenty-four hours he is at work delivering arousing 
addresses, writing orders and despatches, riding from 
place to place to superintend defensive operations, and 
to secure the due collection of supplies. The army has 
to be raised, armed, fed, and skilfully handled, till it can 
meet the foe and feel the way to victory. In common 
language, he is the soul of the army and the defense of 
his country. And feeling the responsibility, and nerved 



Zeal. 2 1 3 

with patriotic ardour, he is the embodiment of zeal. 
Flaming as a torch, he kindles all inflammable spirits 
wherever he goes. The most sluggish feel his power, 
and must wake up or move out of the way. He is the 
Vercingetorix or Arminius, the Wallace or the Washing- 
ton of his day. 

The claims of suffering humanity have sometimes 
been responded to by a benevolent ardour beyond all 
praise. When the cry of the Waldenses, bleeding under 
the exterminating sword of the hired minions of the 
papacy, rose to heaven, many noble spirits were touched 
with a sympathy that kindled the flame of zeal, and so 
were moved to step in and ward off the stroke of death 
from the helpless. When the Protestant Church of 
Hungary, after centuries of dire persecution, was about 
to be annihilated, her appeal to the Protestant states of 
Europe against her powerful oppressor, met with a 
zealous response from many christian hearts. Remon- 
strances poured in upon the bigoted council that directed 
or permitted these cruel measures ; and some noble men 
stood forth conspicuously in their zeal in pressing the 
claims of justice and humanity till the tyrant was com- 
pelled to relax his grasp on his victim. Exhausted, but 
breathing still, the church rose from the dust, when one 
of her most resolute antagonists, confounded by the sight, 
exclaimed, " Either God or the devil must be in favour 
of the Protestants, for when we are about to extinguish 
them, some deliverer rises up to save them. 

The propagation or defence of religious opinions has 
afforded the world many notable illustrations of this 
emotion. We may select two or three examples. Saul 
of Tarsus, brought up in Jerusalem, the head quarters of 
the Jewish religion, at the feet of Gamaliel, a renowned 



214 Christian Psychology : 

doctor of the law, of a susceptible, ardent, and enter- 
prising nature, embraced with vigour and tenacity of 
purpose, at the age of manhood, the dogmas of the Pha- 
risees which had been instilled into him from childhood. 
He found a rising sect dealing fatal blows against the 
denomination to which he belonged, and whose cause he 
had espoused with all his heart. He springs forward as a 
defender. His ardent nature carries him to the front, 
and to the spot where the foe is most powerful. From 
being a defender, he becomes a persecutor, an extermi- 
nator. His zeal for the utter annihilation of Christianity 
was such that he describes himself as " exceedingly mad 
against" the professors of it. He will suffer no oppo- 
sition to the cause which he has espoused, and in his 
fiery zeal he would pursue the scattered fragments of the 
opposition to the ends of the earth. The man is changed. 
His eyes are opened. He approves with all his mind and 
soul what once he hated and despised. And now he must 
propagate what he believes to be the very truth of God. 
Not only are his judgment and conscience won over to 
the new doctrine, but he has received a commission 
from heaven to spread the truth. The fire of heaven 
falls on an inflammable nature. His ardent temperament 
glows under the quickening touch of the celestial fire, 
and he must traverse sea and land to spread the name and 
fame of Jesus. Tumults, scourgings, imprisonments 
check not his ardour. Out of prison to-day, he preaches 
the gospel to-morrow. Penury and want, cold and 
nakedness, hunger and thirst, stay not his progress ; he 
will preach the gospel to every creature under heaven if 
he can. It is enough to say that he has the soul of a 
seraph in a tabernacle of clay. 

Take another illustration. It is the reformer Farel. 



Zeal. 2 1 5 

Born in Dauphine in 1489, he is brought up a Romanist. 
The nature of the man is such that what he is, he is 
with all his heart. In early life he shows extravagant 
zeal for the doctrines which he has been taught. But 
the scriptures come in his way ; he studies them ; em- 
braces the reformed faith ; and throws his whole soul 
into its propagation. He begins his public career as a 
reformer at Basle, in 1524, by sustaining thirty theses 
against the Church of Rome. He meets the moderate 
trimmer of those days, Erasmus, and his fiery spirit 
cannot brook his ways, and he calls him " Balaam." 
Fierce disputes arise, and the Reformer has to flee. But 
all the neighbouring towns are aroused by the thunders 
of his vehement eloquence. He lets none sleep under 
him. Image worship everywhere is denounced with 
startling violence. His friends remonstrate at what they 
conceive his intemperate zeal. But his labours are suc- 
cessful. God owns his zealous servant, and many 
embrace the saving truth of the gospel. He enters 
Geneva, and is compelled to flee because of his zeal ; he 
re-enters, and is again compelled to withdraw. Next 
year he goes back, and now he triumphs — the city 
embraces the faith of the gospel. Four years after, the 
severity of his discipline is too hard for human nature, 
and again he is forced out of Geneva. But he goes 
abroad a flaming light, and he is found in France fighting 
bravely for his master. At one time he is found pleading 
with the princes of Germany for the poor slaughtered 
Waldenses ; and a short time after, up in the moun- 
tains of Jura, pleading with the rude inhabitants to 
believe the love of God to man in the gift of his Son. 
And now over seventy years of age, he is seen in his 
native Dauphine preaching with all the fire of youth 



1 1 6 Christian Psychology : 

against Popery. He is seized, and thrown into prison. 
He is liberated, but it is the prelude to a better liberation 
from a body worn out by incessant toil. The burning 
light passed from earth into congenial company, among 
the shining lights around the throne of the Eternal. 

It would be easy to multiply examples from modern 
advocates both of truth and error ; but the past are 
sufficient. In every truly noble character the suscepti- 
bility is not wanting. Its presence indicates a depth of 
feeling which is itself an element of power; and it is 
generally the offspring of deep and strong convictions 
without which men are not prepared to withstand 
persistent opposition and attain to eminence. How 
important that this soul power be wisely directed ! 
There is a zeal which is not according to true know- 
ledge. Knowledge or information, however false, may 
call up the latent powers of the soul. The regulating 
power of the man is not in his emotional nature. His 
emotions may indeed rise to control him ; but then they 
rise beyond their legitimate sphere. It is the part of 
the emotions to supply a motive power of vast utility. 
It is the part of the intellect to give information regard- 
ing the exercise of this power. And it is the part of 
conscience, in concert with an enlightened deduction, to 
indicate when and how far this motive power is to be 
exercised. As the soul is aflame for action, good or 
bad, when under the influence of this emotion, too great 
care cannot be taken to see that it is the offspring of 
true wisdom. The man who is endowed with this sus- 
ceptibility in large measure, and has it regulated by an 
enlightened mind, will not fail to leave his impress 
broad and deep upon his generation. 



Desire. 217 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

17.— IV. DESIRE. 

The last of the emotions in our enumeration is Desire. 
We have assigned it this place, not because it is the 
last in development, for it prompts the infant to stretch 
out the hand to receive the proffered gift, as well as the 
man of four-score to utter his prayer to the Unseen ; 
nor because it is the last to yield to the impulses which 
excite the emotional nature, for the passing of a gay 
butterfly as well as the occupation of the brightest post 
of earthly honour may awaken it, but because it is often 
found in closest contiguity with that executive or volitive 
faculty, which in the order that we conceive to be the 
most natural and appropriate, will next claim our atten- 
tion. The optative emotion and the volitive faculty 
have an acquired, if not a natural affinity, though they 
are quite distinct as will be proved in the department 
on the Executive power. The movement of the one is 
generally responded to by the exercise of the other. It 
is true that emotions of all kinds lead to an exhibition 
of volitive or executive power in some form, and some 
of them to instant and resolute determinations ; but this 
emotion seems to claim the right of sitting at the elbow 
of the will and a ready attention to its promptings. 
Hence the choice of the position assigned. 

This emotion is notably distinguishable from the 
bodily appetites. The state of the body may enforce 
o 



2 1 8 Christian Psychology : 

mental rest, or stimulate to mental action, and the mind 
may produce precisely the same effects upon the body, 
enforcing rest or arousing to action. When bodily 
appetites, such as hunger or thirst, crave supply the 
mind is aroused to seek after the means of gratification, 
and much ingenuity is sometimes displayed to stop the 
unpleasant craving. And when the mind has discovered 
something that it would be most desirable to possess, it 
may urge the body to protracted and excessive toil that 
it may reach it. Our present business is with the soul 
movement impelling to action both mental and bodily, 
and not with the bodily appetite which may occasion 
mental, emotional, and physical action. 

What is Desire? It is the rising of the soul to, and its 
going out after, something perceived or conceived to be 
pleasing or profitable for a possession. It may exist in the 
form of the faintest passing wish, or in the form of a strong 
and incessant longing. The sight of a book may awaken 
a desire to possess it ; a second ^thought may dispel the 
feeling. Riding past a farm or estate may occasion a 
wish to purchase it, and the feeling may take such 
strong hold that the earnings of half a lifetime will be 
handed over for its legal title. Its power to enslave has 
too often been experienced. Reaching after and 
prompting the soul to possess whatever is seen to be of 
value it may be named the Acquisitive emotion. In the 
ordinary routine of every day it may rise and fall scores 
of times, according as objects of interest are presented 
or sought after. But when any object not immediately 
obtainable awakens a strong and settled desire, the 
emotion may become a habit of the soul, and rise to its 
throne as its paramount power. Then confirmed desire 
may assume the form of ambition, or covetousness, or 



Desire. 219 

godliness, according to the object which has called it 
forth. Sustained emotion passes into habit, as fear into 
timidity ; hope into courage ; wonder into curiosity ; 
joy into cheerfulness ; shame into modesty ; and desire 
of property into covetousness, all which will receive 
attention in a subsequent department. In the case of 
this last emotion the habit acquired takes its name and 
character from the form in which the emotion is 
developed. The object of supreme interest to one may 
be a matter of utter indifference to another, and yet 
both may be at the same time under a marked display 
of desire. How important that only worthy objects 
should be suffered to arouse this dormant power which, 
when once fully occupied in pursuit, is not easily 
diverted from its purpose, but may sometimes make 
shipwreck of the whole man rather than come short of 
the object of supreme desire ! 

Of the three marked developments mentioned above, 
we may give some illustrations. 

A desire to excel, to acquire honour or fame, or obtain 
power, is early seen in some natures. They are aspiring 
or ambitious. They see a position before them of honour 
or power, it may be vacant or at present possessed by 
others, and a desire is kindled to secure that post of 
distinction. In the school-boy, it may be the head of the 
class, the first on the roll of fame ; in the lawyer, a seat 
on the Bench ; in the politician, the premiership ; and 
in the subordinate in the army, the rank of marshal or 
commander-in-chief. How much is made subservient to 
this dominant desire ! Every stepping-stone to each 
height is eagerly sought, and every acquirement needed 
to reach each step, ardently desired. Guided by intelli- 
gence, the end is sought as wisdom would direct. If 



220 Christian Psychology : 

guided by folly, the end may indeed be reached ; but the 
possession will be painful — it may be disastrous. Honour 
obtained by dishonour is worthless. Authority secured 
by infamy is disgrace. 

How have students who were rivals in fame toiled for 
the coveted prize. Books are explored ; all the powers 
of mind are bent to the mastering of the subject ; rest 
is despised ; the midnight hour finds both intent on 
study ; pleasure, and even society, are for the time for- 
saken — one subject alone absorbs all thought, and desire 
bears up the drooping energies to seize the prize. See 
political lawyers contending for the highest place on the 
Bench. How many things are sacrificed that even one 
step towards the point of ambition may be gained. 
Excuses will be framed for the greatest inconsistencies. 
Pledges thought by others to be absolute will be proved 
to be conditional if circumstances require that they 
should be abandoned. Envy will often add her bitterness 
to the contest. Antipathies will rise, and personal crimi- 
nations follow as a consequence. As either approaches 
the goal, the struggle may become intensely, if not dan- 
gerously violent. Thus ambition impels. In the desire 
for promotion, the subordinate officer is often seen 
craving for action, longing to be sent to the post of dan- 
ger, volunteering in the most hazardous enterprises, and 
seeking notoriety by the most dauntless courage. His 
life is altogether a secondary consideration. Fame and 
position are the masters of his energies by evoking 
this now dominant emotion. Through what fields of 
blood have not ambitious warrior-monarchs waded, that 
they might stand alone on the earth, in the summit of 
glory, without a rival ! They gave the reins to an 
insatiable desire, and, like the fiery steed without due 



Desire. 221 

control, it carried them over the precipice into hopeless 
ruin. See Cassar, fallen in the senate house, pierced by 
many wounds inflicted through envy and malice, because 
carried by ambition to the perilous height of sole and 
supreme authority. See Napoleon Bonaparte, chained 
as a dangerous animal on a far distant and solitary rock 
in the ocean. What placed him there ? It may be said, 
His victorious enemies ; but it may also be said, His 
restless and unscrupulous ambition. He desired to be 
the supreme dictator of Europe : in that position the 
crowns of Asia would be at his feet ; then even America 
would be unable to disregard his pleasure ; and thus he 
would be the chief man on earth — the civil head of the 
whole human family. Here was the acme of ambition 
for a military leader, whose armies had borne down oppo- 
sition on many battle fields of Europe, and which 
claimed to be regarded as invincible. One sea-girt isle 
remained unsubdued, and her warrior chiefs on sea and 
land proved too strong for him. The strong man failed. 
He who had the range of Europe was confined to 
a small isle ; and he who was for years surrounded by 
hundreds of thousands, in all the pomp of human glory, 
died alone, and in obscurity. Let ambition be res- 
trained ; desire is not designed to rule, but to serve ; it 
is force, but not authority. 

In civilized lands where trade is general, the desire to 
acquire wealth early becomes a habit. The bent of the 
soul is in many individuals to add pound to pound, 
house to house, and acre to acre. It is when some 
apparent advantage, some special opportunity comes 
within the range of the experienced eye, that the emotion 
rises with power even above the wonted bent, and sets 
the man astir, if it does not produce positive uneasiness, 



222 Christian Psychology : 

till he has put forth his skilled endeavour to acquire this 
new attraction. Some payable bank stock has come 
into the market, he must make h'aste to secure it lest 
another come in before him. By an unlooked for cir- 
cumstance a neighbouring house of great value is set up 
for sale. To him it has special attractions. If possible 
he must compass the purchase of it at a bargain. For 
this his best ingenuity is called into exercise. The 
emotion calls for mental application as well as personal 
effort, and the will responds to the "call, and places the 
powers of the man at the service of this imperious 
feeling. Desire grows with possession. To speak philo- 
sophically, the motion expands with exercise ; its 
capacity is enlarged by successful effort. And now 
possessed of great wealth, insignificant purchases are 
overlooked ; where a few pounds were reluctantly paid 
away, thousands are handed over without emotion ; a 
large estate, with all its attendant grandeur, is coveted, 
and now that it is within his reach, scores of thousands 
of pounds are not withheld that the enlarged emotion 
may be gratified. 

In some, desire for acquisition takes a peculiar turn. 
Some object or animal awakens a wish to possess it. 
Obtained, another of somewhat different form or colour 
produces a similar desire. The second is followed by a 
third, until the man is said, in common language, to have 
a fancy for such things. One has a taste for handsome 
pictures, and every new one must be purchased, if 
possible. Another has a fancy for birds, and the 
curiosities of his aviary are his daily study, and this 
emotion is ever at his service, should any novelty come 
under his eye. A third has a fondness for antiquarian 
treasure. Every fossil or coin, ancient spear head or battle 



Desire. 223 

axe, flint or stone implement brought to his notice, pro- 
duces a wonderful desire to add it to the already encum- 
bered storehouse, unless a similar specimen has been 
already secured. His spirit roams through the cities 
and fields, and along the highways and shores of bygone 
ages, and their remains from nature, art, and literature, 
are eagerly prized. The brick, with its mysterious 
inscription, is more valued than its weight in gold. The 
emotion of wonder, at its first inspection, is instantly 
followed by the emotion of desire for its possession, or 
the both by turns occupy the soul. 

So absorbing and controlling is the habit produced by 
the indulgence of this emotion that it is declared by the 
highest morality to be idolatry. What sacrifices have 
been offered at the shrine of mammon ! Who can count 
the lives cast away and the souls destroyed to appease 
this idol ! See Naboth stoned to death, that Ahab may 
go in and possess his vineyard. See the traitor Judas 
sell his divine master into the hands of his deadly foes, 
for thirty pieces of silver. What dishonesties, forgeries, 
thefts, false swearing, assaults, murders have all sprung 
from the desire to seize the property possessed by 
another ! How many wars, resulting in the slaughter of 
hundreds of thousands, may be traced to the desire of 
one nation to seize the property of another ! Is there 
not truth in the statement that the love of money, that 
is, the desire for money, is a root of all kinds of evil ? 
Unless restrained from excess, it makes the man a 
perfect slave ; it wears out both soul and body, often 
not suffering the poor slave to take the nourishment 
and rest demanded by exhausted nature. How foolish 
this excessive desire for this world's goods ! We brought 
nothing into this world, and it is certain that we shall 
leave it without being able to carry anything with us. 



224 Christian Psychology : 

There is a development and cultivation of this emotion 
which is not only legitimate, but highly honourable and 
beneficial. This may be said of the acquisition of pro- 
perty within a certain limit. But as the moral surpasses 
the material, and the eternal the temporal, the desire 
for the one is to be preferred to the desire for the other. 
Coveting is both forbidden and commanded in the holy 
scriptures. We are to suffer no inordinate desire for 
what belongs to another to dwell within us ; but we may 
cherish an earnest longing for what is in the gift of our 
great Creator, the possession of which by us will injure 
none. We may trace the working of this emotion in spiri- 
tual things in a variety of ways. Knowledge is wealth, 
and spiritual knowledge is an inestimable treasure. It is 
eternal life. Man may well set his heart upon its 
possession. If life here is precious, much more is eternal 
life. The wise shall shine as the brightness of the firma- 
ment for ever. For the wisdom that can secure this 
elevation, man may well toil and strive with all the 
energy of his nature. One that was learned above many 
counted all but loss for the excellency of the knowledge 
of Christ. When a desire for spiritual knowledge takes 
possession of a man, the feeling deserves to be cherished, 
as it may lead into the marvellous light of the gospel. 
Some of the first movements of a regenerated soul are 
longings for light, thirstings for knowledge. When men 
have been accustomed to the public services of the 
house of God on the Sabbath-day, and have enjoyed 
them as their necessary food, a removal to a place 
where no such privileges are enjoyed, occasions a 
craving after these ordinances as often as the Sabbath 
comes round, which no stranger to these feelings can 
fully understand. Then a truly spiritual man may be 
heard saying, " My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth, for 



Desire. 225 

the courts of the Lord." As the votary of pleasure sighs 
for his old companions and enjoyments, when far 
removed from them in a distant land, so does the man 
accustomed to the holy services of God's sanctuary 
pant for a return of these favours when deprived of 
them. When the shortcomings and infirmities of fallen 
humanity are brought home to the heart of the sincere 
christian, there arises within him a desire for holiness, 
a longing for entire conformity to the image of God, and 
a strong wish to eradicate every root of bitterness, and 
close every fountain of iniquity. Then appears the 
s7ri7ro§Y}(ri$ — ardent longing — (2 Cor., v. 2), of Paul, which 
would separate the soul from every taint of corruption. 
And having tasted of the stream, there is a craving for 
the fountain. , The soul longs for God, the felt presence 
of God, the unveiled manifestation of the glory of God. 
" I pray thee shew me thy glory," is the expression of this 
desire. More than the watcher longs for the morning does 
this partially illumined soul crave for the dawning of 
the eternal day. His wish shall be granted. The hour 
hastens when on his waiting spirit the sun of righteous- 
ness shall rise in all his ineffable glory, flooding his soul 
with eternal light. Desire rests everlastingly satisfied 
in God alone. 



226 Christian Psychology : 



DEPARTMENT III. 



THE EXECUTIVE POWER. 
CHAPTER XXIX. 

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. 

We have now reached a Department in Psychology the 
full understanding of which is attended with no little 
difficulty. On this field the most powerful intellects of 
many centuries have waged war with keenest blades. 
If those who have ventured on its exploration have 
differed so widely in regard to its location, extent and 
bearings, we may conclude that some peculiar obscurity 
overshadows it, or that a subtle intricacy marks its path- 
ways. It is interesting to follow some of these explorers 
until they lose themselves, and you can, on retracing 
your steps to a well-known highway, feel a degree of 
complacency that the mistake rests with another and 
not with you. It is no less interesting to mark the keen 
contest between two who have entered the field from 
different quarters, and viewing the point of contact from 
opposite aspects, mutually insist on being exclusively 
right. Yet we owe much to every diligent, patient, and 
faithful investigator who has preceded us. Even the 
mistakes and failures have not been fruitless. Like the 
explorers who have searched for a pass through a range 



Preliminary Observations. 227 

of mountains, or through a long chain of coral reefs, and 
have returned to tell us that no openings can be dis- 
covered in certain directions, they save from fruitless 
toil and limit the field left open for exertion. But many 
have been successful. They have passed through the 
forest with all its jungles, and have left us the result of 
their observations. As would be expected, what has 
been noticed by one has been overlooked by another. 
Hence it is unsafe to trust any one exclusively. The 
whole truth may be reached, so far as comprehensible, 
by a careful comparison of the results recorded by the 
most sharp-sighted and patient noologists, with a per- 
sonal examination of the whole field. When this has 
been done who can presume that he has left nothing for 
a subsequent explorer to bring to light ? May he not 
fear that as he has detected the errors of those who have 
preceded him, some who come after him may have to 
call attention to the proofs of his defective vision. But 
with all the difficulties attending the investigation of 
mind, the science of psychology must advance in the 
hands of skilful noologists. The progress of natural 
science, in all its departments, is the result of patient 
research and the laborious collection of facts in detail, 
so would we hope that some acceptable approximation 
to an enumeration of the prominent distinguishable 
phenomena or faculties of mind, with their necessary 
elucidation, will yet be attained and a solid foundation 
laid for further progress. But while the corner stones 
of the foundation are in dispute the building cannot 
progress. 

In our survey of the human spirit we recognise four 
prominent manifestations or capacities, viz., intellectual 
capacity, emotional susceptibility, an executrve faculty, 



228 Christian Psychology : 

and a normal authority. If these were generally admitted 
as occupying the prominent position assigned to them, 
a correct enumeration of the manifestations of the two 
former, and an exhibition of the place, power, and 
prerogative of the two latter might at length be attained. 
But writers on mental science have long disagreed in 
respect to the place to be assigned to the two latter 
faculties or powers. Less trouble was felt in dealing 
with the intellectual faculties and emotional nature. 
They were patent to the consciousness of the most 
ordinary intellect. But the nature of the will and the 
conscience lay in the back ground, and it was often 
impossible to take their rise and form and bearings with 
anything like accuracy. Here lay the difficulty. The 
mind is one and yet multiform, under a constitution that 
admits of incessant change. At one time the whole man 
may seem absorbed in one intellectual power, such as 
application ; at another, an emotion chains up under its 
power every other faculty ; again the will sits as 
enthroned and seems to give orders to all others ; and 
yet over it a voice is heard saying, this must be done, 
and that left undone, and the whole soul is subservient. 
But not singly only, but together, do these faculties 
generally work. Two or three intellectual powers, or 
two or three emotions, with a consenting will, may com- 
bine on any object. Is it a matter of surprise that men 
should hesitate to distinguish as permanent forms what 
seem to be the ever-varying phases of an unquestionable 
unity ? 

Hence men of profound thought, of a past generation, 
preferred to represent the will, not as a separate, promi- 
nent faculty or power, but as the mind itself in a state 
of volition. And one, at least, of the most distinguished 



Preliminary Observations. 229 

men of the present day, while giving special prominence 
to the power of will, would speak of it as a " generic 
term," as embracing " a class of mental affections,'' 
which he would call "the Optative states of mind." 

We are not disposed to endorse these opinions. The 
faculty of will is clearly distinguishable from the mind 
or spirit as a part is distinguishable from the whole. 
We know that when we will or determine we exercise a 
power very different from that of deduction or judgment ; 
and when we are influenced by grief or anger we are in a 
state, or are swayed by a power equally distinct from 
will or judgment ; and when we are impelled by con- 
science, intellect, feeling and will can be separately 
recognised as acquiescing or co-operating. If, therefore, 
we are to have an enumeration of our mental powers, — 
and for the knowledge of ourselves and for the due 
training and development of these powers it is most 
important, if not absolutely necessary, — it is right that 
those which have a common affinity should be grouped 
together, and distinct and separate powers existing 
singly or alone, should have their due place assigned to 
them. 

It is easy on such a subject to propound a theory, 
and if a man is possessed of penetration and ingenuity 
he will find ample materials, in a question of such 
intricacy, with which to build up specious arguments. 
And if there is a thirst for notoriety, it is well known 
that the broaching of novel and still more of startling 
opinions is sure to secure that notoriety, from the host 
of opponents that shall rise to refute these opinions. 
But our object is truth. We wish to get at the facts of 
the case without respect to the opinions of others, or 
the honour or dishonour attending the investigation. 



2 o Christian Psychology : 

The question asked is, — Is the will myself, or is it only 
a part of myself? And another, — If a part of myself 
only, what power has it ? Does it rule itself, or is it 
ruled ? Is it self-determined, or is it determined by 
things without, including the other mental states or 
powers ? And again, if determined, as a part of the 
mind, by influences external to itself, — What part does 
it act in morality ? How is our freedom, and conse- 
quently our responsibility, affected by it occupying this 
position ? These questions show how far the subject 
reaches, determining our eternal destiny. 

Who can answer these questions ? — The great Spirit 
who gave us our being. Is it presumptuous to ask his 
aid in the study of his works ? Let it not be thought 
so. Our being has no mystery to him. His light can 
dispel our darkness. And his blessing will rest upon 
the patient and diligent explorer, who with reverence 
studies the wonders of mind or matter, and who is 
prepared to give him the glory of every new discovery. 
Man in the pride of his intellect has too often disowned 
God. Few things are more fitted to make men proud 
than the consciousness of superior intellect. And as 
God is ever far from the proud, such men reveal the 
distance by a studious ignoring of his presence or aid 
as something beneath the dignity of learned men. How 
far removed in conviction and feeling from those bright 
spirits who wait upon the Almighty, who are not con- 
fined to tenements of clay nor limited to a petty planet 
as their field of observation, but have the range of the 
universe as their theatre of exploration ! It is not given 
to any one man to make all needed, still less all possible, 
discovery in the domains of mind or matter, as it 
was not given to any one inspired man to reveal all the 



Preliminary Observations. 231 

mind of God, nor all the truth in any one department 
of theology. And inspired writers, whose place was 
posterior to that of others, did not overlook the revelation 
made by those who preceded them, but guided by the 
revealing Spirit, made use of it and built up on it, 
developing the germs of the past and adding fresh 
discoveries. 

It is not ours to follow, in this investigation, the 
labours of inspired men, but it is ours to make what use 
we can of the researches of distinguished men who have 
preceded us, some of whom, alas ! were alienated in 
heart and life from God, pushing our way farther on 
from the way-marks which they have left standing, even 
when they went astray ; seeing more clearly, if we can, 
the true course through the labyrinth, mapping out the 
marvellous convolutions of the everchanging human 
spirit, and so far advancing the science as to facilitate, 
in some measure at least, the labours of those who come 
after. 

We start from a clearly-defined position. We regard 
the Executive Power, the Will, as a distinct power of 
the human spirit, so that what may be predicated of the 
spirit or the man at one time, may not at the same 
time be predicated of the will, and that what may be 
affirmed of the will may not at the same time be affirmed 
of the mind or spirit as a whole. This distinction 
touches the very vitals of morality. It cannot be too 
carefully, or too accurately drawn. Nor should we 
forget the admitted difficulty of exploring the recesses 
of the human soul. Our Maker asks the question, — 
" Who can know it ? " And he answers it by saying, 
— " I, the Lord, search the heart." One difficulty arises 
in the endeavour to trace an emotion or state of mind, 



232 Christian Psychology : 

such as desire or coveting, when it passes from the 
harmless into the sinful, to mark its existence first as a 
simple movement in the spirit, occasioned by an external 
sensation, and then to follow it slowly or rapidly over- 
spreading the soul, silencing or subduing the conscience, 
and securing the power of the will. Where does the 
morality begin ? Is there morality in a state of mind 
as a settled inclination or habit ? Is there morality in a 
passing emotion ? Is the consent of the will necessary, 
that is, must the executive power of the soul go with the 
emotion or suggestion before it comes within the domain 
of morality ? These questions must be answered. They 
meet us at every turn in life. The great Teacher has 
told us that desire may reach such a stage, as when it 
secures the consent of the will, although the actual deed 
is not performed, that it becomes a transgression of the 
law of God. Although it is difficult to know the heart, 
that is the soul or spirit, we are commanded to search it, 
to discover what is wrong and what is wanting, and to 
keep it with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of 
life. 

No material illustration can adequately express or set 
forth the immaterial and indivisible. We have -to explain 
a unity in multiplicity. What we may illustrate by a 
square and speak of as having foundations and corner 
stones, another may illustrate by a circle, with its ever- 
expanding and contracting circumference, but both are 
inadequate. It would require the combination of many 
material and animate objects, external to man, to repre- 
sent the marvellous spirit the glory of this lower creation, 
and for that combination the Creator alone is equal. 
But for passing states, emotions, or commotions, many 
illustrations may be found in external nature. Calm 



Preliminary Observations. 233 

patience may be compared to the unruffled sea reposing 
at rest in the glory of a summer evening. Restless 
activity to the ever-expanding and contracting movements 
of the sea-jelly when floating under the heat of the 
tropical sun. Violent passions to the shooting out and 
up of the fiery flame when fed by some powerful com- 
bustible. But when we seek for illustrations of intellect 
and will, as in distinction and determination, we can 
only discover, external to man, imperfect approaches to 
either in the instincts of the lower creation. We may 
observe the ox distinguishing among the herbs placed 
before him for food, refusing to eat the one, and readily 
devouring the other. And we may see the horse chafing 
under the restraint of a too limited and scanty pasture, 
ranging round the fence until he has discovered some 
bars lower than others, when he determines to hazard a 
leap and escape from confinement. But in neither is 
there a judgment or deduction from premises, but simply 
the instinct or impulse of animal nature. To man belongs 
the dignity, if he choose to assume it, of acting from 
rational arguments and selected emotions, and of regula- 
ting his conduct by a prescribed rule. When we would 
apprehend man with all his variety of faculties, we must 
fix our thoughts on all the outgoings and incomings of 
his spirit, and by the most patient and minute investi- 
gation of every phenomenon, attain to true distinctions 
and correct generalizations. In this manner would we 
prosecute our inquiries into the manifestations of will as 
exhibited in the human soul under a great variety of 
circumstances. 



234 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XXX. 

NOTICE OF OPINIONS ON THE NATURE 
OF THE WILL. 

DESCARTES — LOCKE LEIBNITZ EDWARDS REID — 

M'COSH HODGE. 

It is interesting to notice what men of thought who 
have given attention to this subject have written as the 
result of their reflections. As it is useless to multiply 
quotations, a few only will be introduced. The selec- 
tion is made from writers of the present and two 
preceding centuries. The acknowledged ability of the 
few whose opinions are laid before the reader is generally 
the main ground for the choice displayed. It is proper 
to state that the same writers do not always adhere to 
any one definition given, but variously express the 
same idea, or what they wish to be regarded as sub- 
stantially the same idea. At times also they, or some of 
them, are liable to the charge of either inaccuracy or 
inconsistency. The difficulty of adhering to precisely 
the same definition, under the various shades of thought, 
will be admitted by all who have studied this subject. 
These remarks are made lest it should be said that 
other definitions differently expressed may be found in 
the same writers. We begin with the distinguished 
thinker who started from the axiom, — " Cogito, ergo 
sum," 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 235 

Descartes (Born, a.d. 1596). — " The power of will 
consists in this, that we are able to do or not to do the 
same thing." 

This concise definition expresses not only a mental 
power but the freedom of that power. The idea con- 
veyed is that there is a power in the mind to choose or 
reject anything proposed for its acceptance or perform- 
ance. It is not sufficiently explicit, for if you substitute 
the word " mind " for " will " the same thing might be 
affirmed; and if you substitute "freedom" for "power" 
the same thing might also be affirmed. As it now stands, 
its correctness may be called in question, as applicable 
to the will only in certain conditions. May not a man 
possessed of will be able to do, and not be able to leave 
undone the same thing ; as a man enslaved tf) a vicious 
habit, his power of resistance is so far impaired that 
the presentation of the temptation is constantly, if not 
invariably, followed by the indulgence ; and on the other 
hand a man may be so habituated to the service of God 
that he is able to do, but not to leave undone, in all 
ordinary circumstances, that service. In both cases 
there is no force or constraint. The man acts freely, 
that is, of his own accord, the will yielding to the pre- 
vailing bent of the mind. If it be said that under 
sufficiently strong persuasions the evil habit might be 
resisted and the deed left undone, and that powerful 
temptations might in like manner prevail to set aside 
the service of God, which had been the life of the 
righteous man, we grant it. But then the definition 
must be understood as representing the faculty in its 
primitive state, its natural and normal condition, liable 
to impulses of opposite kinds, and unsustained by any 
power extrinsic to itself. Of Adam, in his innocence 



236 Christian Psychology : 

and under trial, it might be said, that his power of will 
was such that he was able to do, or not to do the same 
thing. 

Locke (Born, a.d. 1632). — A volition or an act of the 
will is, — "An act of the mind knowingly exerting that 
dominion it takes itself to have over any part of the 
man by employing it in or withholding it from any 
particular action." 

Stripped of its verbiage, this means that a volition, or 
act of the will, is the mind knowingly controlling a part 
of itself in any particular way. It is not quite satis- 
factory. First in respect to the knowledge of the act of 
the will. We often take notice of the acts of our will, 
and often compel others to take notice of our volitions. 
But are \v% always conscious of each particular volition ? 
Does the mind never will without inspecting the mental 
operations ? Consciousness is that power by which we 
can inspect ourselves, and observe what is going on in 
the mind, as the natural eye can inspect the body ; but 
with this difference, that while a part of the body, the 
back and head, are mainly excluded from vision, the 
whole soul may be inspected by itself. The question is, 
is it necessary to a volition that the mind takes notice 
of it at all times ? — that the reflex act involved in 
inspection or consciousness should invariably accom- 
pany every act of volition ? We think not. We think 
that volitions often take place without this reflection. 
A man rises and acts from a mere impulse of feeling ; 
or from an impression made on his mind from a passing 
object, as an individual passing his window. No time 
is taken to examine, or look at, or reflect on the mental 
process by which the mind has controlled the body in 
any particular way. If by "knowingly" Mr. Locke 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 237 

simply means that intelligence accompanys the volition, 
that as the mind is one, its display of power is attended 
with mental vision, as all mental acts of intelligent 
beings are, we may agree with him. We do not mean 
that man always sees or understands what he is doing, 
and therefore willing to do, but that the intelligence of 
the individual, however faint or however powerful, is 
not detached from the acts of the will. But this is 
distinct from the act of consciousness in respect to each 
particular volition ; which in our judgment is very 
frequently absent from volitions. It is right to think 
what we are doing ; but it is also well for us when 
prompt action is needed, that we can will without 
looking at the process by which we will. 

The definition is explanatory of a particular state of 
the mind rather than of a faculty of the mind. It is true 
that a faculty is just the mind in a particular state, but 
it is not by any means the whole mind. Hence that may 
be a true description of a faculty which is a very defective 
description of the mind, and that may be a true descrip- 
tion of the mind in a particular state which may not be a 
satisfactory definition of the faculty to which that state 
refers. We would be disposed to reverse somewhat the 
definition, and say that in volition a particular faculty of 
the mind is controlling the whole man, rather than the 
mind controlling any particular part of the man. Both 
may be true ; the question is simply which is the more 
accurate or appropriate. By the will in volition I can 
employ and control a particular intellectual power, say 
attention ; in this case one part of the mind controls 
another; it is better therefore to define the will as a 
faculty than to speak of it as the " mind knowingly- 
exerting dominion," inasmuch as the exertion may be 



238 Christian Psychology: 

confined, in great measure, to one part of the mind, 
while another part, the feelings, as in the case of a 
father punishing a beloved child, may be consciously in 
opposition. 

Again, it is not necessary to a volition that the mind 
be in such a state that it may do or not do any particular 
action. A volition may be simply positive. The reasons 
for action may be so entirely on one side that there is no 
hesitancy in respect to any particular course, as a man 
perceiving but one door of escape from imminent danger. 
Nor is volition the product of the mind only when 
balanced as on a pivot, so that it may with equal ease 
turn to the right as to the left. It is rarely in such a 
condition, and yet it is constantly putting forth volitions. 
The weights in each scale of the balance are seldom 
equal, and the determination of the will is in favour of 
the heavier. The mind or the man may be said to hold 
the balance, not the will ; and when the intellect has 
declared where the preponderance lies, the executive 
faculty of the mind, the will, rises into play and exhibits 
itself by a volition or determination, according to what 
was felt or perceived to be the superior weight of evidence 
on either side. 

Leibnitz (Born, a.d. 1646). — "When we exercise a 
volition we always follow the collection of all inclinations, 
alike on the part of effective reasons as of feelings, which 
thing very often happens without any express judgment 
of the intellect." — Opera. 1. 156. 

Although this extract from the writings of the great 
scholar is rather a description or declaration of the ante- 
cedents of volitions than a definition of a volition, yet it 
implies what a volition is. It is an effect ; the act of the 
will, or the mind in a state of determination ; and is 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 239 

occasioned by inclinations or influences in the form of 
reasons or feelings, or both, more or less numerous, 
operating on the mind and bringing it to this state that 
it resolves, wills, or determines. We have nothing 
definite here in respect to a distinct faculty or power. 
What is said may be affirmed of the mind, but as the 
action of the mind in this state is distinguished from 
other operations of the mind which preceded this volition, 
it may without impropriety be understood as referring to 
the commanding influence of an executive faculty. He 
very truly adds that the will often operates without any 
express judgment of the intellect. Not that it works 
apart from the intellect, but it waits not for an express 
judgment of the intellect in every particular act. It 
would be unutterably tedious to us if we could not move 
or resolve on any act, mental or bodily, until the judgment 
had formally pronounced upon it. We may indeed defer 
action till this takes place, till we are satisfied of the 
propriety of our proceeding in this particular way, and it 
is well that we have this power ; but we can also move 
so swiftly in our determinations that it is impossible to 
trace any antecedent judicial process. In such cases the 
will follows instantly an immediate apprehension or 
decision of the intellect. 

Edwards (Born, a.d. 1703). — " The faculty of the will 
is that faculty or power or principle of mind by which it 
is capable of choosing ; an act of the will is the same as 
an act of choosing or choice." And this word choosing 
he defines as involving " refusing, approving, liking, em- 
bracing, determining, directing, commanding, inclining, 
a being pleased or displeased with." 

To these definitions we make two exceptions. First, 
in the term selected to express the act of the will. In 



240 Christian Psychology : 

choosing, in the ordinary sense of the word, there is 
something more than the exercise of will. An intellec- 
tual faculty is prominently in exercise. The power of 
distinction is at work, doubtless under the concurrence 
of will, but the work of choosing, so far as it involves the 
idea of marking distinctions which is essential to choice, 
if it is choice and not a picking up at random, is an intel- 
lectual as distinguished from an executive operation. If 
we are to distinguish faculties we must keep distinct 
what are clearly distinguishable. All intellectual opera- 
tions are carried on with the concurrence or under the 
direction of the will. But if an intellectual faculty, such 
as apprehension, is chiefly engaged, we speak of the 
operation as intellectual, and with propriety, although 
we take no notice of the concurring or directing will. In 
choice, the work of the will is to fix on the object 
distinguished by the intellect as superior or most appro- 
priate. Hence choice is the effect of a compound cause, 
intellect and will, the latter following the former; and 
the term choice may not properly be applied to the 
distinguishing of the intellect, for that alone is not choice. 
Nor to the fixing upon of the will, after the distinction 
made by the intellect, for that alone is not choice. 
To choose is to make choice of, and implies a selection ; 
for if there is but one object presented to us, there is in 
common language "no choice." Hence the term selected 
by president Edwards to represent the normal act of the 
will is not sufficiently explicit, and is also too limited. 
We often will, or exercise a volition, when one single 
thing is before the mind. We rise up or sit down ; we 
take or decline to take a book presented for our acceptance. 
No alternative was before the mind, no selection was 
offered, at the time the volition took place. How then 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 241 

could there be a choice ? Every effort must be made to 
secure appropriate terms, otherwise it is impossible to 
make progress in a branch of learning so difficult as this. 
If it is said that we chose rather to rise than to retain 
our seat, or to retain our seat rather than rise — and that 
we chose to accept or decline the book rather than the 
opposite — we have only to reply that in numberless 
instances the mind will not look for an alternative, nor 
does it wait till it is suggested, but decides immediately. 
It will not do to fall back upon what is implied as possible 
in a mental process. We seek to describe mind as we 
find it, and when we have at our service explicit terms 
they ought to be adopted. Second, we take exception 
against including in the idea of volition such terms as 
" inclining, liking, or disliking." When a man is simply 
inclining towards a thing, there may as yet be no volition. 
He may stand before a counter and examine an article 
of goods placed before him for purchase, he may be 
inclined to purchase because of its colour or texture, 
but the question of price may debar the will from the act 
of volition which would make the purchase. There is an 
inclination to purchase, but no determination or volition. 
A person may be found often ''liking" or "disliking" 
under the influence of an emotion of love or hatred. 
The will may be concurring, but it would be improper to 
represent a display of an emotion as the expression of a 
volition. If this were allowed every intellectual and 
emotional exercise of the mind might be defined a voli- 
tion. The clear and penetrating intellect of Edwards 
was directed to the overthrow of a doctrine concerning 
the condition of the will. He proved to his own satis- 
faction, and to that of many others, that the will does not 
subsist in a state of contingency, but is ever swayed by 



242 Christian Psychology : 

the strongest motive — that it is not self-determined, but 
is determined by something within or without the mind, 
but external to itself. He dealt with psychology only so 
far as it trenched upon his particular business, and hence 
his comparative neglect of accurate definitions at the 
outset. His work on the Will displays great acumen, 
and is an elaborate array of arguments ; but discards the 
graces of style, the author being intent on the demo- 
lition of the position of his antagonists and the 
maintenance of a doctrine involving important theological 
issues. On the point assumed it may be pronounced 
unanswerable, if we interpret his " necessity" by "moral 
certainty," which is the real meaning allowed to it. 

Reid (Born, a.d. 1710). — " The determination of the 
mind to do or not to do something which we conceive to 
be in our power." 

This is sufficiently brief and explicit, and may be 
accepted as correct. The limitation of the last clause 
might be called in question. Do we never determine 
without conceiving that the act is within our power ? 
Certainly we determine to do many things which are not 
within our power, both mental and bodily — but do we 
always conceive them to be within our power when we 
will them ? Are we conscious, at the time of willing, 
that the thing which we purpose doing is within our 
power ? May we not will under the impetuosity of feeling 
without any conception of ability ? We hear persons 
say, — " I never thought what I was doing," but the 
meaning is that they did not consider or reflect on what 
they were doing. We cannot detach intelligence from 
volition, but we may detach the exercise of certain 
important intellectual faculties, such as distinction or 
deduction from volition. Can we detach the conception 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 243 

of power from volition ? Left to ourselves we ordinarily 
determine to do what we conceive to be within our 
power, otherwise we would be exercising volitions fruit- 
lessly — but we may be persuaded to attempt, and so far 
to determine, what our judgment tells us is clearly 
beyond our power. A man may say to another, — " Lift 
the end of that anchor." In reply he may answer,— " I 
am sure I cannot." Under persuasion he may make the 
attempt, saying, " I know I cannot." It may be said 
that what he wills is to make the attempt, but not to lift 
the end of the anchor ; in other words, he wills to do 
what he conceives to be within his power. This is true, 
although he may actually lift the anchor's end in the 
attempt, and so do what he did not actually will to do, 
from a conviction that it was not in his power. 

We are disposed to accept Reid's definition as correct, 
though we may not express our idea of the action of will 
in precisely the same words. When we will there is 
certainly some apprehension or conception of power in 
us, however faint, to do what we determine, even should 
it go no farther than an attempt. If there is a conception 
present that we have absolutely no power, we refuse to 
make any movement. Even in this there is a volition, 
but it is a volition in confirmation of the definition, which 
is also a determination not to do what we conceive not 
to be in our power. Yet we must not forget that we 
acquire habits of volition that seem to take for granted 
that we have the needed mental or physical strength, 
without waiting for any formal conception of the power 
needed for the particular act. We will to move in any 
particular way, and instantly we move. In the absence 
of any overflow of animal spirits or fulness of muscular 
energy prompting to action, we have an abiding impres- 



244 Christian Psychology : 

sion, which is a certain conception, of more or less power 
for the performance, or at least attempt at performance, 
of the act which is the object of the volition. 

It may be proper to notice the opinions of one or two 
living authors. We cannot say that the progress of this 
science is invariably onward. The results, as proceeding 
at all times from the reading more or less thoroughly 
and accurately of the operations of the mind, must 
depend on the penetration, patience, and general ability 
of the individual author. Powerful and independent 
thought, however disarranged and improperly applied, 
can scarcely be said to be lost. Real thought is treasure. 
It is the part of the wise to apply the treasures of the 
past and present to use. 

M'Cosh speaks of the will as follows: — "The essence 
of will is choice, or the opposite of choice, rejection. It 
takes various forms, and may have degrees of intensity; 
if the object be present, it is adoption or consent, and if 
the object be absent, it is wish or desire, and when it 
leads to action it is volition, but under all its forms it is 
characterized by active selection or rejection." Again : 
" We think that it is high time that writers on mental 
science should be prepared to admit that there is a 
separate class of mental affections, which we may call 
by the generic term Will, or as we would prefer, the 
Optative States of the mind. These are very numerous, 
and differ from each other in degree and in certain 
minor qualities, but they all agree in this that they 
contain choice or rejection. In this class we include 
not only volition, or the determination to act, but 
preference, adoption, if the object be present, and wish, 
desire, if it be absent." — Div. Gor., 4th Ed., p. 267. 

We cannot adopt this interpretation of Will. We 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 245 

have already commented on Edwards's definition of will 
as choice. We cannot help thinking that what we 
conceive to be the inaccurate definition given by the 
great name of Edwards has led to vast misconception. 
We have already shown that choice is a compound 
effect, that the exercise of the intellect prepares the way 
for the exercise of the will, and that this latter exercise, 
detached from the former, is not choice but simply 
determination. W T e are not prepared to admit the 
variety of forms of the will above submitted. It has 
degrees of intensity as all may admit, and is exercised 
on an infinite variety of objects, but its outgoing is one, 
determination. M'Cosh admits that whatever forms 
it may assume, when it leads to action it is volition. 
What do we know of any faculty but by its action ; if 
its action is always volition we can only describe it as 
the faculty whose invariable and essential action is 
volition. The assertion that under all its forms it is 
characterized by active selection or rejection is opposed, 
we might say, to universal consciousness. We constantly 
exercise our wills where there is but one object pre- 
sented to our view ; we do not wish to conjure up an 
alternative ; we decide at once to accept or reject. It 
will not do to say that that very action implies a 
preference, a doing this, rather than not doing it ; but 
in definitions we look for explicit terms when they are 
at hand, and reject terms that can only be true by an 
implied construction — and which implied conception is 
not present to the mind of the one exercising will in the 
greatest variety of circumstances. The term choice 
ought to be discarded as doubly indefinite, as not 
expressive of a simple exercise of the will, according to 
the true meaning of the word, and as only applicable 



246 Christian Psychology : 

in this imperfect way to a comparatively small number 
of volitions. 

This author, in the second extract given, speaks of 
the will as a separate class of mental affections, which 
may receive the generic name Will, but which he prefers 
to call the Optative States of the mind. In this way he 
would make the will multiform like the intellectual 
capacity and the emotional susceptibility. But this is 
against nature as revealed in consciousness. Executive 
power is one, not many, in the individual soul. It may 
have a thousand objects on which to operate, but the 
power is one. In intelligence we feel the necessity for 
various sources of light ; in emotional susceptibility we 
admire the wisdom displayed in the various fountains of 
power, but the directing energy of that power must be 
one, while the soul is one and indivisible. When we 
ask for an enumeration of these states of the will we are 
told that " they all agree in this that they contain 
choice or rejection." In his view it is not only determi- 
nation, but preference and wish also. Preference is 
choice, and wish is desire, and both have been already 
disposed of. An illustration is given in proof that desire 
is a state of the Will. A dear friend is very ill, and we 
naturally wish, and that most earnestly, for his recovery. 
In this wish or desire M'Cosh thinks that there is more 
than emotion. What can be stronger than the longing 
desire in our breast, while we wait beside the bed of the 
sufferer, for his recovery ? But what is this longing 
desire ? Is it not feeling — strong feeling ? — a feeling so 
strong that the will is at its service to do anything in its 
power to save the life threatened. But the feeling is 
distinguishable from the will, which promptly shows 
itself in accepting any new remedy proposed. The 



Opinions on the Nature of the Will. 247 

explanation of the case is simply this : The will is 
generally concurring in all intellectual and emotional 
operations. In some cases the emotion absorbs the 
whole energy of the soul, as a man under the power of 
terror, when the will actively operates in carrying the 
man away from the scene of danger. In the case 
referred to desire for restoration has taken possession 
of the soul — every faculty seems subservient to it ; it is 
emotion, but emotion in paramount influence, with the 
will ready for action when any work mental or bodily 
is demanded by it. Notwithstanding these apparent 
misconceptions and defective or inaccurate definitions, 
the author, in a note, expresses his pleasure in finding 
eminent men " representing the will as an unresolvable 
and independent potency." 

We close this section with the opinion of a living 
author of great celebrity for intellectual power, Dr. 
Hodge, of America. He says: — "The will is that 
faculty by which we determine to do something which 
we conceive to be in our power." And again : — " It is 
altogether better to confine the word to this its proper 
meaning, and not make it include all the forms of feeling 
involving approbation or delight." — Theol. vol. 11. 403 ; 
11. 297. 

This definition is almost identical with that given by 
Dr. JReid. We approve of it as correct, with the simple 
explanation given before, that we may not always have 
a formal conception of power in each particular volition, 
but certain volitions, apparently spontaneous, spring 
from an abiding habit of mind, in which habit may be 
found an indefinite impression of power. 

It is with profound respect that we have offered our 
independent observations on the conclusions of men 



248 Christian Psychology : 

justly renowned throughout the world for their high 
intellectual ability. We have limited our observations 
mainly to the nature of the will. It will be necessary 
next to consider the state of the will in the act of volition 
or at the time of determination, whether moved ab intra 
or ab extra, whether in a state of indifference, moral 
certainty, or absolute necessity. On this arena intellec- 
tual gladiatorship has displayed its sharpest weapons. 



Condition of Will in Act of Determination, 249 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

EXAMINATION OF THEORIES ON THE CONDITION 
OF THE WILL IN THE ACT OF DETERMINATION.. 

The first question that now meets us is, — How is the 
will determined ? Is it determined by influences or 
feelings or powers within itself alone, that is ab intra ? 
Or is it determined by influences or motives external to 
itself as a separate mental power, though it may be 
internal to the mind, that is, ab extra ? The answer to 
this question depends much on our psychological view 
of the will. If we view it simply as the mind in a 
particular state, and therefore embracing all the faculties 
of intellect and feeling displayed in other states, we may 
claim for it a self-determining power, for we are merely 
claiming a self-determining power of the mind. With 
this all but fatalists and pantheists might agree. Or if 
we view the will, as Dr. M'Cosh, in the work already 
referred to, is disposed to do, as " a faculty of a most 
peculiar kind, a faculty constrained by nothing out of 
itself, but following its own free and independent laws," 
and at the same time make this faculty to include a 
class of mental affections," to be " called optative states 
of the mind," which are said to be " very numerous,'' 
we might almost be disposed to admit that the will is 
determined ab intra. But these views of the will are 
most unsatisfactory. If we are to classify our mental 
powers, none has a higher claim to a distinct place 
Q 



250 Christian Psychology : 

than the will. In speaking of the will, then, we must 
not speak of the mind as a whole, or there is an end to 
all right conceptions on this question. Nor can we 
accept the theory that the will is a " class of mental 
states,'' following their own or "its own free and inde- 
pendent laws," for the will as manifested in determination 
its true and natural outgoing is one, and is clearly 
distinguishable from every intellectual or emotional 
state. If the will had a class, a numerous class of 
mental states, all governed by its own free and indepen- 
dent laws, would it not be a mind within a mind, or be 
in itself the soul of man, with the intellect and emotions 
as mere appendages, instead of being what they are 
essential parts of the one spiritual being ? So far does 
this writer carry the power and authority of the will, 
that he says : " So far as the true is preferred to the 
false, or the right to the wrong, or the pleasurable to the 
right, it is by the exercise not of the reason, or the 
conscience, or the sensibility, but of the will." It is 
clear that he is attributing to the will what belongs to 
the mind as a whole, or at least to other faculties besides 
the will ; for in the cases referred to, both reason and 
conscience are in exercise as well as the will, not cer- 
tainly to the exclusion of the will, but as certainly to 
inclusion of the reason, and generally of the sensibility, 
and frequently of the conscience. Following out his 
theory, he is brought to state : " We hold the will to be 
a general potency or attribute of mind " — p. 269 ; in 
plain terms, mind possessed of power. Any attempt to 
maintain the theory as definitely propounded, would 
lead to endless complications, and hence the reasoner 
falls back on the " general potency," which nullifies the 
idea of a distinct faculty. How true it is, that when 



Condition of Will in Act of Determination. 25 1 

we are on the right track in dealing with mind every 
thing harmonises, but if on the wrong course we are 
confronted by walls or thickets at every turn. 

We adhere to the idea that the will is a distinct and 
powerful faculty of the human soul, and not a mere 
general potency, spread over all states and emotions, 
and shared alike by all. Holding this, we ask what are 
its endowments ? Has its eyes of its own by which to 
guide its course ? Has it feelings of its own to impart 
power to its separate determinations ? These would 
make it a mind of itself. It has not these separate 
intellectual and emotional states. The mind has them ; 
they are not needed in duplicate ; in the mind and in 
the will ; and they can influence the will ; and the will 
by means of one or more of them can influence others. 
Stripping the will of intellectual and emotional endow- 
ments, what do we attribute to it ? — Power ; power to 
fix upon, to determine, to adhere to, to control. If 
power, and not reason or feeling, be attributed to the 
will, we have already indicated our opinion that the 
will is not self-determined, or determined ab intra. The 
power exercised by will is often the offspring of intel- 
ligence and feeling, and hence if they are not within the 
will, they must be without. But has the will the power 
of moving at any time of its own accord, that is, of 
determining without any motion or influence from 
without ? Activity belongs to the mind as a whole, 
and therefore in a measure to every part of it ; a spirit 
is self-acting ; it is not a piece of inert matter, requiring 
to be acted upon before it moves ; but the particular 
determinations of the mind, exercised by its faculty the 
will, are the results of influences external to the will, 
but within the mind. These influences may be 



252 Christian Psychology : 

sensations from external nature, convictions of the 
judgment, emotions, or dictates of conscience. When 
any one, or several of these combined, acquire para- 
mount possession of the soul, they acquire the governing 
power, the executive is at their disposal. While we 
say that the mind is self-acting, we cannot say with 
M'Cosh that "the will is self-acting, and has its power 
or law in itself." For this would make the will, the 
man, the intelligent responsible being, which it is not, 
for it is not endowed with separate intelligence, nor with 
the deep springs of action in feeling ; but the man is 
the aggregate of intellect, emotion, will, and conscience ; 
and we may say that responsibility belongs to man 
because he is endowed with each of the four, and 
because he is at liberty to exercise his faculties. 

If we say that the will is determined by influences 
external to itself, do we not land in fatalism ? Are not 
all volitions bound by an unalterable necessity ? By no 
means. The man is free to adopt the reasons or 
influences that determine the will or to reject them. 
As a matter of fact he often does reject influences, in 
the form of strong reasons, which in the opinion of 
others, should have swayed him. They had a certain 
weight with him, but other influences had a stronger ; 
and the stronger prevailed to a determination in their 
favour. We sometimes say that a man is very obstinate, 
that he will not listen to reason. But what are the 
facts ? He has his own notions of the path of duty, 
and he refuses to let go his hold of them, or to suffer 
them to be overcome by opposing ones ; and he keeps 
them before his mind as the rule of duty, and the will 
determines accordingly. In fact, if it did not, the whole 
mental constitution would be incapable of attaining 



Condition of Will in Act of Determination. 253 

what is called character. If man had no control over 
what influences his will, he would then be a mere 
machine. But he has control over his will, and over 
his conduct as the outgoing of the will, by having 
control over what influences or determines the will. 
But is not this the will determining the w T ill ? Not 
exactly. The will, guided by reason or conscience, 
and stimulated by feeling, may, as the exponent of the 
whole man, fix upon the motives or the grounds which 
should influence the will in any contemplated action. 
It is not the will determining the will, but the whole 
man determining the will, either in particular acts 
whose antecedents are fully examined, or by the forma- 
tion of character which gives a general bent to the will, 
or an ordinary certainty in respect to its volitions. The 
man is free in performing particular acts, and in the 
formation of character, and therefore responsible. 
Fatalism, or physical necessity, can only exist when all 
freedom has ceased ; but freedom is not taken away 
while the man has the power to choose what influences 
and determines his own conduct. Men know that they 
exercise this power ; therefore they know that they 
are free, and not bound by any fatalism or physical 
necessity. 

Some writers in their recoil from everything approach- 
ing to necessity have maintained the idea of contingency 
in the will at the formation of a volition or determination. 
By such the condition of the will is described as one of 
indifference. They maintain that they have the power 
of determining against the strongest motives ; that at 
any time the volition might have been the very opposite 
of what it was, the motives or influences remaining 
precisely the same. They go so far as to hold that the 



254 Christian Psychology : 

will is independent of reason, of feeling, and even ot 
God. Cousin says : " The will is mine, and I dispose 
of it absolutely within the limits of the spiritual world." 
Reid says : " If in any voluntary action, the determi- 
nation of his will be the necessary consequence of 
something involuntary in the state of his mind, or of 
something in the external circumstances of the agent, 
he is not free." These statements have a show of 
reason ; let us examine them. If Cousin means that 
the will is his, as an attribute of the mind is his, he is 
right ; but if he means that he can dispose of it without 
respect to God or man, the external world, or his own 
internal mental state or moral character, he is mistaken ; 
for both God and man may influence his will, through 
his intellect or conscience ; and his own internal state, 
mental or moral, and the external circumstances in 
which he is placed are ever influencing and sometimes 
swaying his will. In the very nature of things he cannot 
be independent of himself, though he may be indepen- 
dent of a part of himself if that part be a non-essential. 
There is no " I," separate from the will which can 
dispose of it ; but the will in company with other 
faculties may dispose of itself and these other faculties ; 
in other words, the man may dispose of himself. 
Reid's statement amounts to this : That a man is not 
free if his determination in any voluntary act be the 
necessary consequence of something involuntary in the 
state of his mind, or of something in his external circum- 
stances. We are not quite prepared to admit this. A 
habit may have such a hold of a man that it may be a 
striking characteristic ; he may hate it, and would fain 
rid himself of it ; it may be said to be something 
involuntary in the state of his mind ; and a determina- 



Condition of Will in Act of Determination. 255 

tion to which he has come may be the result, the 
necessary consequence of this habit or state of mind, 
and yet the man is free ; that is, he is a free agent, 
though in common language he may be said to be a 
slave to his evil habit. We confidently ask, is not 
general experience in favour of this opinion ? We 
know that man is free, and yet we know that he often 
acts from acquired evil habits which he professes to 
hate, and which we may believe he does hate. And in 
respect to the second clause, are not many determi- 
nations the necessary consequences of the external 
circumstances of the man ? A person goes among the 
vile ; the temptations to evil are before him ; he does 
not resist these temptations, he joins in evil. His 
volition to do as he has done may be said to be the 
necessary consequence of his external circumstances. 
What he did was done freely by yielding to temptation. 
He chose to go into temptation and he yielded to its 
power, and he was free in both cases. But may there 
not lurk something in the term necessary which has 
been overlooked ? We take the phrase used in the 
ordinary acceptation, as equivalent to natural sequence. 
A necessity that precludes or overbears all freedom of 
choice we disown, as making a man a mere machine. 
But a natural sequence, which may become from estab- 
lished habit an invariable sequence, we regard as in 
perfect consistency with highest freedom. 

We therefore reject the idea that the will imme- 
diately anterior to the act of determination was in a 
state of independence or indifference, capable of deciding 
against the strongest motives, equally as for them as if 
suspended on a pivot, with power to neutralise all 
influences that might hang as weights on either side. In 



256 Christian Psychology : 

point of fact, this is not true. The will is not, and can- 
not be, independent of the influences that surround it 
and ever operate upon it. It must be guided by some- 
thing. And who is to guide it but the man who is 
endowed with it ? And how can he guide it but by 
motives such as reasons ? If it is independent of all the 
reasons which man can bring to bear upon it, then it is 
a power within a power, an agent within an agent, a 
man within a man — which is absurd. If not indepen- 
dent, it is not indifferent, but is moved by ideas, reasons, 
feelings, and is constantly taking sides with one party 
or another, obeying the prevailing bias of the mind in 
its ideas or passions. If the will should be always 
indifferent, how could character be formed ? There could 
be no steadiness, for the man that was truthful, honest, 
and pure to-day, might be the very opposite to-morrow. 
This cannot be true, for it is contrary to universal 
experience. It would make a man care no more for the 
good than the bad, for the true than the false, as he 
must be in a position to determine as readily for the one 
as the other. The saints in heaven, who must be re- 
garded as most free, must be as ready to do evil as to do 
good ; and the devils in hell to do good as to do evil. Such 
a theory of contingency, of the will in a permanent state 
of contingency, is a phantom of the brain. 

Nor is the will capable of deciding against the 
strongest motives equally as for them. This is conceived 
to be necessary for its complete independence. It is 
not correct. The will yields to the strongest influences, 
whatever these may be, and come from what quarter 
they may. This is the constitution given to it by the 
Creator. It is the best possible. In vain do we ply man 
with arguments, if he is able at any moment to cast them 



Condition of Will in Act of Determination. 257 

to the winds, without supplying their place by still 
stronger. The determining power in man is placed at 
the disposal of the strongest causes, reasons, motives, 
or influences. The strongest may not be the best ; they 
may in the estimation of sound judgment be the very 
worst ; but they are the strongest in the man's mental 
constitution. The strongest influence controlling the will 
may be a long-cherished habit, and against it reason is 
almost powerless. Sometimes one idea may secure the 
will to its side contrary to the natural feelings of the 
man, and contrary to what was a long-cherished expec- 
tation. This idea has risen for the time to paramount 
influence, and the power of will goes over to it, as its 
right. As in a constitutional assembly of representa- 
tives, a few ideas skilfully handled and pressed on men 
may sway their votes contrary to what was expected of 
them, and thus a majority of votes may be obtained, 
and by them is secured the executive authority in a 
country. This is admitted to be right — it is the expo- 
nent of freedom. 

The will may sometimes be as on a pivot ; the argu- 
ments on one side are so nicely balanced by those on 
another, that the man is in suspense as to what he 
should do. He may refuse to decide in the circumstances, 
but even that is a concession to strength, to uncertainty 
as stronger for the time than certainty. When a small 
preponderance is felt in one scale, the will goes over to 
that, and the greater the increase of weight on one side 
over the other, the greater the force of will on that side. 
We are persuaded that this is the natural process of the 
human soul, and that it is the wisest and best possible 
arrangement for man's liberty and progress. 



258 Christian Psychology : 

Hence we conclude that the will in the act of deter- 
mination is swayed or controlled, not by its own inherent 
choice or pleasure, as if endowed with intellect or 
feeling, nor by any mental states or affections that have 
been imagined to belong to it, and to be subservient to 
its laws as a separate department of mind — but by 
influences or motives external to the will itself, but 
internal to the mind, which influences or motives may 
have their origin or strength in impressions from with- 
out, in convictions of the judgment, in the rising of the 
emotions or in the settled bent of the disposition an 
acquired habit of the soul constituting what we call 
character. It is not determined by any law or physical 
necessity which would destroy man's freedom, nor does 
it exist in a state of indifference, equipoise, or indepen- 
dence, having the power at the same moment to yield 
to or set aside the strongest motives at the time of each 
volition or determination ; but its true position is 
between these two extremes, a capacity or readiness to 
be influenced, determined, controlled by what is within 
the mind at the time of a temporary or permanent 
nature, so that it is an expression for the time of the 
state of the man, the determination of his will revealing 
to himself and to others his character, judgment, and 
feeling. 



Freedom and Ability. 259 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

FREEDOM AND ABILITY. 

It will be impossible to apprehend aright the nature 
and operations of the will without a clear apprehension 
of the proper meanings belonging to the terms, freedom 
and ability. A proper explanation of these terms 
will throw light upon the power and condition of this 
great central faculty of the mind. In the past the con- 
fusion of ideas arising from the inappropriate use of one 
or other has been most embarrassing to the progress of 
thought, and has contributed to prolong the contro- 
versies of which the will has been the subject. It is 
high time that this confusion should cease. The terms 
are not interchangeable. There may be freedom where 
there is not ability, and there may be ability where 
there is not freedom. Let us illustrate. A man may 
be free to swim across a river to which he has come in 
his journey, but he has not the ability, and he dare not 
venture, having never learned the art of swimming. Or, 
in matters of mind, a man may be free to study the most 
abstruse questions of astronomy or of theology, but he 
may not have the ability, the intellectual acumen and 
the power of application necessary to apprehend these 
difficult matters. Or, in the domain of morals, a man 
may be free to throw off some long-indulged evil habit, 
that is, there is no restraint laid upon him to retain it ; 
nay more, the solicitations of his friends and his own 



260 Christian Psychology : 

judgment may be in favour of its abandonment, and yet 
he is painfully conscious that he has not the ability. 
There is freedom, but not ability. 

Again, there may be ability and not freedom. The 
captured slave may be able to swim ashore from the 
vessel which has run down and broken his canoe, but he 
has not the freedom ; he is seized and bound hand and 
foot, and hoisted on the deck of the slaver. Or a man 
may have the ability of mind to investigate the most 
important doctrinal questions, but he may not be free to 
do this, having given, of his own choice, his time and 
abilities to other matters ; or, having vowed to abstain, 
in obedience to the demand of his superiors, from the 
consideration or study of such subjects. It may be said 
that there is a freedom in this very bondage. There was 
a freedom in the voluntary placing of himself in circum- 
stances that preclude the study of doctrinal questions, or 
in the placing of himself in subjection to religious 
superiors ; but a man cannot be free and bound at the 
same time, and in respect to the same thing. The vow 
of obedience taken by a Jesuit places his faculties, all his 
mental abilities, and therefore his will, at the disposal of 
his superior. He retains an ability both physical and 
mental, but he has disposed of his freedom. He has 
placed himself very much as a machine in the hands of 
his superior. But as freedom is the power of choice or 
the ability of determining according to our pleasure, in 
disposing of freedom has he not disposed of ability ? — 
He has disposed of ability, but it is controlling ability ; 
while he also retains ability, but it is a subservient 
ability. The Jesuit holds his powers in subjection to his 
will, but he has placed that will in subjection to a 
superior will. He has ability, but he is a slave. Again, 



Freedom and Ability. 261 

in the region of morals, a man may have the ability to 
do many things which he has not the freedom to do, 
which he is not free to do, which he has not the will to 
do. He is able to forgive a debt, he is able to sustain a 
benevolent cause presented to his notice, or he is able to 
forego revenge, but he does not choose to do so. He is 
able, but he is not willing. Can we say that he has not 
the freedom ? Are we not accustomed to say that he is 
free to do so, if he please ? He has freedom, and he has 
not freedom. He has freedom so far as respects external 
constraint ; no one prevents him from acting in the 
manner proposed, but the will is not free to do this or 
that particular act because strong convictions of an 
opposite character or tendency fetter its action, and so 
far the action of the agent, as the determination of the 
will is the expression of the man. The greed of money 
may interpose a barrier in the way of forgiving the debt ; 
the spirit of covetousness may long have regulated the 
man ; the will is subservient for the time to this ruling 
desire ; the will is in a measure enslaved by it, and so 
far the man is in bondage to it. He is free to forgive the 
debt if he please, but he does not please to do so ; on the 
contrary, his pleasure lies in the opposite direction. His 
pleasure is his preference, and that preference accords 
with his ruling passion. But is there not a contradiction 
in saying that a man has an ability to do a certain thing, 
and yet that he is restrained from doing it, that he can do, 
and that he cannot do the same thing ? — Not exactly, for 
a man may have a natural ability to do something which 
certain accidentals or circumstances may prevent him 
from doing, may deprive of the freedom of doing. The 
man before referred to may have the natural ability to 
swim ashore, but the accidental restraints take away his 



262 Christian Psychology : 

freedom. So the man who is a creditor is in a sense the 
possessor of the amount claimed as debt — it is his ; he 
has the sole power to dispose of it, that is his ability ; 
but the accidentals of the man, his present strong love of 
money, ties up the hands of the man in respect to 
generous acts — he is not free to wipe out this debt 
so long as these strong cords are round his heart. 
For a similar reason he is not free to sustain a 
benevolent cause claiming his support. He has vast 
wealth, he has the ability to dispose of it, but a 
restraint is on him when the proposal is made that 
a portion of it should be given for a certain object. 
The love of money may operate in this case as in the 
last, but there may be also an antipathy to the cause 
asking support. These two feelings may in this case 
conjoin their forces and fasten down the will in oppo- 
sition to the request presented. Loosen these cords by 
argument or appeal ; remove the dislike, and persuade 
to benevolence, and you may set the man free to act 
according to your wishes. In the meantime he is 
guided and restrained by views and feelings with which 
you may have no sympathy, but which are at present 
the ruling powers in the soul, and ruling they restrain 
from action in this particular way proposed. There is 
a general ability, but a particular bondage. When a 
question of revenge comes up there is often a conflict 
of passions. Pride, hatred, and anger cry out for 
retaliation, benevolence and fear withstand the demand. 
The man has the ability to take revenge in inflicting 
physical injury or financial loss, or injury to character. 
Will he do so ? This depends upon his state of mind ; 
and the state of mind on the prevailing power of certain 
emotions. If the fear of God or man, and a feeling of 



Freedom and Ability. 263 

compassion or benevolence surmount the wild and 
turbulent emotions clamorous for retaliation, they will 
lay a restraint upon the restive spirit, and when the 
arm would be uplifted to strike it is held back, when 
the lips would speak reproachful words they are sealed 
up, and when a stroke of his pen would inflict financial 
ruin on one who has done much injury, it is restrained. 
He has the ability to take revenge but not the will. He 
is free, and he is not free. He is free as a responsible 
agent ; but not free by his own choice to do this par- 
ticular action. With conscious ability, and in the 
exercise of highest freedom, he has tied up his own 
energies from going forth in a certain way, deemed 
unworthy of his position as a man or a christian. There 
is ability without freedom. The freedom of the will is 
the freedom of the agent ; but the freedom of the agent 
is not always the freedom of the will, if by the freedom 
of the will you understand a liberty to do or not to do 
the same thing at the same time ; in other words, to 
determine for or against any particular thing with equal 
ease at the same time. Every responsible being is a 
free agent, that is, he is at liberty to determine according 
to his views, feelings or character, to what is within 
himself and belongs to himself. He determines for 
himself and of himself ; he is therefore free. But that 
determining faculty, the will, while the man is a free 
agent, in the sense explained, may be found invariably 
and most certainly determined in one particular direc- 
tion from the established character of the agent. This 
may be called restraint, or bondage, but it is the 
restraint of freedom. The term bondage is not the 
most appropriate, for the man acts freely. It is perhaps 
better to express that condition as a fixedness of will 
according to a confirmed disposition of soul. 



264 Christian Psychology : 

On examining the history of man throughout his 
whole revealed course, we find the will in three distinct 
conditions. It first expressed the condition of an upright, 
holy soul, inclined only to good. As man, when first 
created, had no evil principle or disposition, the will was 
steadily exercised in a right direction, that is in accordance 
with the mind of God. It had received, however, no 
permanent bias, as man had not yet an acquired charac- 
ter, the result of prolonged exercise in any particular 
way. An opportunity was afforded him of securing that 
character which would give a fixedness to the will in a 
right direction ; in plain terms, which would confirm him 
in holiness. He failed in the hour of trial. The false- 
hood suggested was believed ; that belief led to a deter- 
mination to do what was forbidden. The deed was 
attended with the guilt and pollution of sin, which com- 
pletely altered the creature's condition before God, and 
as a consequence his internal spiritual state. That 
being altered, the will reflected the change most accu- 
rately. Man then entered on the second stage of his 
history. 

Partially obscured in intellect, blunted in conscience, 
and deadened in noblest emotions, the soul moreover 
presented a positive alienation from all that was just and 
pure and good. Sin, as a moral disease, had infected it, 
and it now became filled with enmity against God. The 
will expressed what that nature approved and felt. It was 
habitually turned away from God and the things of God. 
As the piece of iron placed in the compass may draw the 
needle from the point to which the magnetic current 
would lead it, and completely reverse the course from 
which it was a conductor; so sin, taking possession of 
the human soul, deadened and destroyed its heaven-ward 
tendency, and shaped its course hell-ward. The needle 



Freedom and Ability. 265 

acts freely, and yet the iron remaining in one position, 
its action is not only partially swayed but regulated by 
it; there is a fixedness in its movements, it is determined 
in one direction and not in two or three. So sin 
remainirg in the soul, in the heart the seat of the 
affections and the source of power, draws in its own 
direction, according to its own natural bias all the 
energies of the man, which direction is revealed by the 
will. It is said by inspiration that, viewing man 
according to the general bent of his disposition, " Every 
imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil, 
and that continually." That evil heart ever bent on 
sin in some form pointed the will in a direction most 
congenial to itself. 

We are not to suppose, however, that the will is 
never swayed to the right or left of this point to which 
it habitually looks. It is often swayed by light in the 
understanding to direct the energies of the man in a 
path more becoming a rational being. Sometimes high 
and noble thoughts of honour, of benevolence, of 
patriotism, acquire a firm hold of the mind, and coun- 
teract the selfishness and depravity engendered by sin, 
and swing the will round as if halfway back to its old 
and honourable position. Sometimes feelings of regret 
for conduct condemned by conscience sets the soul in 
opposition to the attractions of sin, weaken greatly for 
the time its power, and enable the recollections of 
former days, or the present admonitions of friends, to 
acquire an influence of which the will is an index, in an 
avowed determination to throw off for ever the yoke of 
sin, and to lead a new life. Under present impulses the 
will has gone more than half back. The man may seem 
changed. And for the time externally he is. Like 



266 Christian Psychology : 

Ahab, the equally foolish and wicked king of Israel, he 
may humble himself and walk softly under the terror 
produced by the prophecy of the coming vengeance of 
the Almighty. Or like the Ninevites, the man may 
bemoan his folly and wickedness, and turn for the time 
from all his wicked ways, and strive to do what he 
conceives to be right. Then the will will be found 
oscillating between the pressure of the convictions of 
duty strengthened by sorrow and fear, and the pressure 
of temptation aided it may be by evil spirits or false 
friends. Sometimes the common operations of the 
Holy Spirit which are ever counteracting the evil dis- 
positions of men, and preserving our world from being 
wholly inundated by crime and corruption, overcome 
the power of sin for a time so far as to lead to a great 
reformation of conduct, and to an apparent delight in 
the things of God. The mind is enlightened by the 
word of God, and receives it with joy. The man pro- 
claims his renunciation of all sin. He will hereafter 
only serve God. Sin however is not removed. The 
guilt of unpardoned sin remains, and with it its essen- 
tially degrading influence. The will for the time responds 
to the power of light in the understanding, and to the 
dictates of conscience, and turns the face of the man 
heavenward. What is now wanted ? Remove the 
perverting iron that has reversed the true course of the 
magnetised needle. Take away the guilt of sin, and 
remove the curse attending that guilt, by pardoning 
the sinner, and magnetise the soul afresh with heavenly 
influence. 

In the regenerated state the will is habitually, but 
not invariably, inclined heavenward. In the scrip- 
tures it is said that he that is " born of God doth not 



Freedom and A bility. 267 

commit sin ; for his seed remaineth in him ; and he 
cannot sin, because he is born of God." But it is also 
said by the same scriptures, by one who delighted in 
the law of God after the inner man : " I know that in 
me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing — for to 
will is present with me, but how to perform that which 
is good, I find not. For the good that I would, I do 
not, but the evil which I would not, that I do. I find 
then a law that when I would do good, evil is present 
with me." Both these passages teach the same doctrine ; 
but the one goes farther than the other. The one 
testifies to the divine principle implanted in regenera- 
tion, which has reversed the past tendencies of the 
soul, and given them, and with them the will, an 
habitual upward and heavenward tendency. The other 
testifies to the same change by saying, " I will and I 
would do good," but reveals also the powerful and 
sometimes prevalent evil still existing in the soul, inter- 
fering with the doing of good, and sometimes securing 
the consent of the will. These are opposing principles 
in the believer's soul. The flesh wars against the spirit. 
The spirit has the victory, but not invariably. The 
flesh, or carnal mind, has deep-rooted power in the 
fallen soul ; and while grace produces desires for holi- 
ness, expressed by " I would," or " I wish," or even 
secures the actual determination of the will to do good, 
the man is constrained to admit an opposition to these 
desires re- asserting a place in his soul, and a deadness 
and incapacity to perform the good for which a positive 
volition has been secured. In every deed the will has 
a part, whether the deed be good or bad. But the deed 
may be in conformity with or against the general 
character of the man. When sin is committed by the 



268 Christian Psychology : 

believer, his will is concerned in it, and he is guilty, 
although it is against the general tendency of his soul, 
and as a consequence against or contrary to the general 
bent of his will. The work of sanctification is generally 
a progressive work ; sin is undermined, weakened and 
destroyed ; and holiness is established, strengthened, 
and made permanent ; and in proportion to the progress 
of sanctification will be the steady inclination of the 
will to all that is divine and heavenly. 

In the glorified state the will has attained to a fixed- 
ness which will be perpetual. It is the result of an 
enduring character. Its condition differs somewhat 
from the state of the will when man was in innocence, 
but untried. It was then only inclined to good, it could 
not be otherwise, as reflecting the image of a soul in 
which no vein of perversity existed ; but it is now in a 
state of glory the index of a character acquired by grace 
and confirmed by the sentence of the supreme and 
eternal Judge. The soul is now perfectly holy, and as 
such the will must be perfectly disposed to good without 
any restriction or check ; and as that perfect holiness 
is unalterable and eternal, the will must be unalterably 
and eternally disposed in one direction, to obedience to 
the will of the Supreme, to holiness his pleasure, and 
to such acts of worship as will demonstrate the entire 
agreement of the creature with the Creator, their wills 
being one. 

If it be said that this fixedness of will is inconsistent 
with freedom, it may be asserted that God is not free. 
For what will is more fixed than His not to do evil. He 
cannot lie. He cannot do injustice. His will or deter- 
minations reveal his character, and as that character is 
unalterably holy, he being unchangeable, it follows that 



Freedom and A bility. 269 

his will will never be disposed to evil in any form, that 
it will everlastingly tend or point in the same direction. 
And yet God is most free. Freedom consists in liberty to 
act according to our pleasure. This pleasure may be 
the outgoing of temporary convictions or feelings of a 
permanent character. In the one case it may point in 
various directions according to influences ; in the other it 
will point steadily, it may be everlastingly, in one direc- 
tion. But in both cases there is freedom, and in the 
latter the highest type of it, for the pleasure is uniform 
and uninterrupted. 

Ability is easily distinguishable from liberty. Adam 
had ability of mind to meet the suggestions of the 
tempter by other and stronger considerations. He could 
have reflected on the veracity and goodness of God, and 
keeping his mind fixed on these preserved his will in 
conformity to the will of God. In our fallen state the 
ability of man is very much impaired. He can easily do 
wrong, but with difficulty can he do good. The under- 
standing that might influence the will aright is often in 
darkness, the good emotions are with difficulty aroused 
for " the heart is hard ;" and even after intellect, emo- 
tions and conscience have moved the will to determine 
aright, the strength to perform what is good is wanting. 
The soul sinks under the burden ; it cannot climb the 
steep, it cannot mount up with wings ; it is like a man 
enfeebled with disease ; it is like a bird with a broken 
wing. In an unconverted state, it may do many things 
commendable and proper, but it cannot serve God, and 
so cannot please him, for the will is habitually disposed 
to evil in some form, generally the service of self to the 
exclusion of God or his glory. When renewed by the 
Holy Ghost, it possesses power according to the grace 



270 Christian Psychology : 

received, according to the light in the understanding, the 
quickening and elevation of the affections or emotions, 
and the vitality and power of conscience. This transfor- 
mation is the work of the indwelling Spirit ; he restores 
the power of these faculties that had been impaired by 
sin ; and he also works in the soul of the believer both to 
will and to do, that is making the soul willing in the ordi- 
nary and natural way, and then enabling the soul to carry 
into execution its own determinations. In the absence 
of that power, the regenerated soul is often painfully con- 
scious that he has not the ability to perform what he 
would. He cannot by a mere volition remove sin, guilt, 
pollution, weakness, sorrow. Means must be used ; and 
yet he finds an inability to use the means in the way pre- 
scribed. Who can restore the lost ability ? God alone 
can. " O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself, but in me 
is thy help found." Raised from spiritual death, and the 
pit of corruption, and trained by grace for glory, the soul 
finds itself endowed with strength for every duty. 

In the faintest exercise of liberty some ability, mental 
or physical, is displayed ; and in the highest form of 
freedom all the ability of the creature is fully developed. 
Thus liberty and ability which had been co-ordinate and 
equal in man while innocent, were found dissevered, 
antagonistic and unequal, when the soul, diseased by sin, 
was visited with light and grace ; but become reunited in 
equal perfection in a state of glory. 



Definitions and Illustrations. 27 1 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

DEFINITIONS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Before proceeding to define our English word " Will? 
and to illustrate its various meanings, it may be profit- 
able to notice how the earliest writers expressed the idea 
of a volition or determination, what terms were used to 
express " desire " or "wish " as distinguished from set- 
tled purpose, the state of mind in each case, as well as 
the act of the mind. The oldest writings extant are the 
books of Moses. With them are associated the produc- 
tions of other sacred writers of great antiquity. While 
not dealing specially with psychology the scope of their 
writings led them frequently to enterthe domain of moral 
science, and to express the different shades of feeling 
and purpose, both divine and human. With these 
writings in Hebrew and Chaldee, the Septuagint transla- 
tion may be compared, as fitted to throw light on the 
specific meanings of these terms as viewed by those who 
understood and spoke the Greek language which is pre- 
eminently adapted for intellectual distinctions. The books 
of the New Testament present almost every shade of 
wish or desire, and also of purpose or determination • 
and may also claim our attention, as the ideas of the 
sacred Scriptures have largely moulded our language at 
the period of its most rapid development. It will be seen 
how far the Septuagint selection of terms influenced the 
writers of the Greek New Testament. Our object is not 



272 Christian Psychology : 

to follow the English translation where it has chosen to 
insert the word "will" either as verb or noun, but to 
cull a few passages where the original writer has the idea 
of a fixed purpose or determination in his mind, as a 
matter settled or decided, which he wishes to convey to 
the reader ; where he has the idea of a mere desire or 
wish ; where he has an idea of the state of mind, as wil- 
lingness or voluntariness ; and where he has to relate the 
deed or act of the mind, and to note how and in what 
circumstances these ideas are represented in words. 

The Hebrew scriptures contain at least three verbs 
which express decision, purpose, determination of mind, 
as Abhah, Chaphetz, and Yagatz. Each has it peculiar 
shade of meaning, and two of them, Abhah and Chaphetz, 
are sometimes used to express a state of mind in which 
desire is prominent with concurrent will, but all express 
or have been used to express, a settled purpose of mind. 
We will notice some passages as illustrative of the 
meaning of these terms. 

In Genesis xxiv. 5, the verb Abhah is used in the 
following sentence : — " Peradventure the woman will 
not be willing to follow me." Here there is something 
more than disinclination to come with a stranger. The 
meaning is — " But if the woman will determine not to 
come with me," as pointing to a purpose or resolution 
of mind. In Deuter. ii. 30, the same verb occurs as 
follows : " But Sihon, king of Heshbon, would not let 
us pass by him." Here is a very positive determination. 
The Israelites wished to pass through this king's terri- 
tory in peace, and proffered a request to that effect. 
They met with a stern refusal, backed up with an array 
of military force to prevent the passage. In the 10th 
chap., 10th v., Moses expressed by the same verb the 



Defin itioHS and Illustrations. 273 

decision of Jehovah not to destroy the people in answer 
to the request of his servant. An instance of settled 
determination expressed by the same verb occurs in 
chapter 25, 7 v. A man refuses to marry his brother's 
widow. That refusal is reported to the elders of the 
tribe by the widow. In doing so, she uses this term, 
which must imply in the circumstances a positive 
decision. In Isaiah xxx. 9, the word is used to convey 
the determination of a settled habit of mind, in these 
words: "This is a rebellious people, lying children, 
children that will not hear the word of the Loid." The 
word Abhah descends through two or three intermediate 
languages into our own, and appears in avarice and its 
connections. From the Hebrew it passes into the 
Greek, auoo, and thence into the Latin aveo, whence 
" avarus," and our English avarice. It originally means 
to breathe or blow after, and expresses strong desire so 
frequently the origin of volitions. Its derivation would 
intimate that it might express a state of mind in which 
emotion was paramount. 

The word Chaphetz is used to express both desire and 
determination. In that very ancient book, the book of 
Job, it occurs in chapter xxxiii. 32 v. : " I desire to jus- 
tify thee." Chaphatzti tzadheqcha. Here beyond question 
it expresses a wish or desire ; any supposed determi- 
nation could only be conditional. At the same time 
the will is not excluded from acquiescing in that desire. 

But in Deuter. xxv. 8, it expresses the determina- 
tion of the will: " The elders of his city shall call him 
and speak unto him, and if he stand to it, and say, I 
like not to take her," lo chaphatzti Vqachtah. Here, 
beyond question, is a fixed determination. It amounts 
to this : " I have made up my mind not to take her." 



274 Christian Psychology : 

In i Sam. ii. 25, the same verb occurs in a passage 
which conveys the idea of a settled purpose. " Notwith- 
standing, they hearkened not unto the voice of their 
father, because the Lord would slay them." It was no 
mere wish or pleasure of the Almighty to destroy these 
worthless sons of Eli, but it was his purpose or 
determination to punish them for their revolting 
wickedness that they might be a warning to others, and 
therefore he left them to their own perverse disposition, 
that in the exercise of their own wills, as-free agents, they 
might go on to their pre-determined destruction. This 
passage opens up an intricate question, but we cannot 
turn aside here to discuss it. 

In Isaiah liii. 10, we find this word in a sentence which, 
in our opinion, has not been wisely rendered in our 
translation. The words in English are : " Yet it pleased 
the Lord to bruise him," va Y'hovah chaphetz dacco. 
" But the Lord purposed to bruise him," or more freely, 
" Yet it was Jehovah's determination to bruise him." In 
this way we eliminate all mere desire or pleasure in such 
a sorrowful transaction. We know that the Almighty 
does not afflict willingly even the children of men ; that 
he has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, and could 
have no pleasure, in the common sense of that term, in 
the death of his Son ; but it was his purpose or deter- 
mination, formed before the advent of his Son, that he 
should be bruised as the substitute for sinners. The 
word here, then, conveys the idea of an unalterable 
determination. Chaphetz, after passing through Etrus- 
can and Greek, re-appears in the Latin " gavisus," the 
participle of " gaudeo," from which we have our own 
" gaudy" and its connections. Originally denoting 
taking pleasure in, or delighting in, it came to mean the 



Definitions and Illustrations. 275 

act of the will as the result of feelings in which the soul 
was absorbed. 

The third term, yagatz, unlike the preceding, has not 
its origin in feelings of desire or delight, but its employ- 
ment to express determination is the result of an intel- 
lectual exercise. It frequently means to consult or 
advise, and from that follows the determination to act 
as the result of deliberation and forethought. 

In 2 Chron. xxv. 16, yagatz occurs to denote a 
divine purpose. Thus the prophet says : " I know that 
God hath determined to destroy thee because thou hast 
done this." It was not that the Almighty would take 
counsel to destroy the vain-glorious king, but that he 
had already determined upon it to punish him for his 
absurd stupidity and perversity in serving the gods of 
Edom, which had proved their incompetence to protect 
the very people whom he himself had overthrown. The 
word here clearly represents a firm decision. 

In Isaiah xiv. 24, and xix. 17, the same term is 
found denoting the settled purpose or determination. 
In the one case God has purposed to destroy Assyria, 
and in the other Egypt. The divine mind has formed 
a positive determination in respect to both countries 
which he will execute. An instance of the determina- 
tion of human minds after consultation may be given. 
In 2 Chron. xxx. 23, it is said : " And the whole assem- 
bly took counsel to keep other seven days, and they 
kept other seven days with gladness." The word is 
vayuvagtzu. It is not simply that they took counsel, for 
no determination of any special nature might follow, but 
that they determined on or after consultation to continue 
the religious services. Hence the translation might be 
improved by the substitution of the word " determined" 



276 Christian Psychology : 

or " resolved," instead of the words " took counsel ; " 
for they certainly did more than take counsel on the 
matter ; but no other word is used to express that 
further process ; hence this term must be understood as 
conveying the mental decision or resolution arrived at. 

In the Chaldee, such terms as chathac, charatz, were 
used to convey the ideas of decision or determination, 
their primary meanings being "to cut off," "to separate," 
as matters on which a conclusion had been attained. 

There were three nouns also used by the Hebrews to 
express pleasure, will, determination. When it was 
something agreeable to the mind on which a decision 
had been reached, the term selected was generally 
ritzon, expressing both the will of God, as in Psal. xl. 
8, cxliii. 10 ; and the will of man, as in Levit. i. 3, 
and xix. 5. When it was the outgoing of feeling, or a 
purpose the result of enflamed passions, the common 
word for soul, nephesh, was employed as in Gen. xxiii. 
8, where it corresponds with our word " mind," and in 
Psal. xxvii. 12, where the word " passion " is nearer the 
force of the original. When the volition was a 
deliberate judgment, the term mishphat was used. It 
was in a measure a judicial decision. For a state of 
mind, represented as acquiescing and voluntary, cor- 
responding to the English word "willing" the ordinary 
word was nadhabh. In such passages as the following, 
1 Chron. xxix. 9, Psal. ex. 3, Judges v. 2, and Nehem. 
xi. 2, this word is found in some of its forms. Its 
original idea is doubtful. It may be impulse ; hence 
inward impulse or spontaneity. 

It is not without object that these different terms 
are submitted to the consideration of the thoughtful 
reader. 



Definitions and Illustrations. 277 

How did the Greeks represent in their language the 
ideas found in the writings of a race that preceded them 
in literature ? For each of the three Hebrew verbs, 
Abkah, Chaphetz, and Yagatz the Septuagint translators 
have used fiovXopcti (Boulomai) as in Gen. xxiv. 5 and 
Isai. xxx. 2, for abhah ; Isai. liii. 10, Deut. xxv. 8, and 
1 Sam. ii. 25, for chaphetz', and 2 Chron. xxv. 16, 
Isai. xiv. 24 and xix. 7, for yagatz. Another term 
very frequently used by them, as equivalent to the two 
first of these Hebrew verbs, is 0sAco (thelo). This verb 
is given as the interpretation of abhah, in three places 
at least, as in Deut. ii. 30 ; x. 10 ; xxv. 7 ; and for 
chaphetz in Prov. xxi. 1, and Job xxxiii. 32. 

For the noun ritzon there was a double interpretation. 
When it was understood to mean a voluntary willing- 
ness, or a will the result of -spontaneous feeling %=xto$ 
(dektos) was the chosen substitute, but when it meant 
the will as the result of judgment, 0sA>^a (thelema) 
expressed their ideas. For nephesh the natural sub- 
stitute was found in \J/u^>j (fisuche) and for mishphat 
xgi(j,ct {krima). For nadhabh they found an equivalent in 
ex.ov<Tio$ (ekousios) " voluntary." 

From an examination of the circumstances in which 
fiovXopcii and fleAco are used, it will be found that where 
there is wish or desire manifestly implied, Q=\co is used in 
preference to (3ov\opui, and that where counsel is implied 
as the antecedent to determination, /3oi»Ao/xa< is adopted. 
This is contrary to the opinion of some lexicographers, 
who would make fiovkopcti to express wish rather than 
OsAco. To /3onAojxa< beyond question belongs " deter- 
mination," the result of deliberation. The very noun 
/3ouA>j counsel might settle that. But to 0=Ao; belongs 
both wish and will, mere desire or pleasure and settled 



278 Christian Psychology : 

determination. BovXo^ai or (3o\opui is from the Semitic 
bol the mind or heart — in Syriac bol, and in Arabic bal 
both the same in meaning. Hence fiovXoptxi would origi- 
nally mean to apply the mind or " to mind," and hence 
to counsel, purpose, determine. 

In the New Testament QsXoo has the widest range. 
It may mean wish, please, desire, or determine. In 
Matt. viii. 3, " I will (0sAc«), be thou clean," — may be 
either I please or I determine, according to the idea 
attached to the preceding sentence. " If you are 
pleased to do so, you can make me clean — I am pleased 
to do so," &c. " Or if you determine, you can make me 
clean — I determine," &c. In the same way, Matt. xx. 15, 
pleasure or determination. But in Mark xiv. 7, " When 
ye will ye may help the poor," pleasure or disposition is 
preferable to determination. In Mark xv. 12, where 
Pilate asks what should be done with Jesus, Qskoo must 
mean desire or pleasure rather than purpose. He wished 
to please the Jews, and asked what was their desire. So 
in all those cases of applications for cure when the 
Saviour asks the sufferers what they will — the meaning 
is not what do you purpose or determine, but what is 
your desire or wish. But 0&Aco means positive determi- 
nation also, as in the following passages, Matt. xxi. 29. 
The young man says to his father when requested to 
go to work in the vineyard — " I will not," o v q s ^ m . — John 
v., 40, " Ye will not come unto me that ye might have 
life;" Rom. vii. 18, " To will is present with me, but how 
to perform I find not ; " Phil. ii. 13, " Both to will (Qtkw) 
and to do." In these cases the action of the determining 
power of the human soul is prominent. 

We may now notice the use of fiovXopoii by the 
same writers. In Acts xv. 37, we find Barnabas 



Definitions and Illustrations. 279 

reported as determined to take his nephew John Mark 
on his second missionary tour. That act of mind is 
expressed by fiovXopxi. That it was no mere wish, but 
a very fixed determination, all capable of understand- 
ing the passage know. In Act xviii. 15, Gallio 
determines to be no judge in religious matters. Here 
the " / will not " of our translation is ov (SovAopai in 
in Greek. It was not a mere wish of the judge, but a very 
firm determination as he soon showed. In like manner 
the determinations of God are expressed by this term — 
1 Cor. xii. 11 ; Matt. xi. 27, with 2 Peter iii. 9. as dis- 
tinguished from 1 Tim. ii. 4, where QsXoo is used as ex- 
pressive of desire or pleasure. The " all " of 2 Peter iii. 
9 is to be interpreted with the " long-suffering to us- 
ward," as pointing to all the objects of his grace. Also, in 
Heb. vi. 17, where the "willing" of our translation is from 
fiovXopca as conveying a very settled determination which 
calls forth not only a promise but an oath. From these 
passages may be gathered the true meaning of these 
terms ; and they are sufficient to modify at least the dis- 
tinctions of some lexicographers. 

The term in use for the power or faculty of will is 
Qs\v)[jLa (thelema). It is spoken of the human and divine 
will. In 1 Cor. xvi. 12. The will of Appollos was very firm 
against acceding to the request of Paul. And in Ephe. 
i. 11, we have the phrase /3ouAvjv Qs\yi[ji,cito$ as expressive 
of the deliberate determination of the divine will. 

With this notice of the mode of expressing the different 
shades of feeling or thought with relation to purpose or 
determination contained in the most valuable series of 
writings extant, and which deal more with the soul of 
man than any other, we pass at once to our own English 
word " Will," The verb to will is from the Anglo-Saxon 



280 Christian Psychology: 

Willan,a.nd connected in the root origin with the Gothic 
Viljan, the German Wollen, the Latin Velle, the Greek 
(ZouXopcti or BoXopoLi, which is from an old root Bolo, the 
Syriac Bol, the Arabic Bat, and the ancient Chaldee Bol. 
The last three are one in signification, and mean " mind " 
or " heart." The ancient Assyrian who exhibited the vigor 
of his Bol in the first of widespread empires on earth, has 
his counterpart in the English, whose energetic Will has 
spread out the widest of modern empires over sea and 
land. The noun " will " is defined by Webster thus : 
" The power of choosing ; the faculty or endowment of 
the soul, by which it is capable of choosing ; the faculty 
of preferring or selecting one of two or more objects ; " 
in simple words, " the power or faculty of choice." 
In support of this, extracts are given from Stewart, 
Reid, and Hooker, none of which, except the last, 
and that indirectly, bears out his definition. It would 
seem that Edwards' definition of will so widely spread 
in America has misled the otherwise acute and able 
lexicographer; unless he conceives that use and wont 
rather than psychological distinctions should guide. It 
is patent that choice is not a simple act of the will — but 
an act of the will led by an intellectual exercise with 
which it never ceases to be identified, and which intel- 
lectual exercise is the leading or chief power in the 
act, the will or determining faculty concurring not 
directing. The second definition includes " volition " 
as the action of the power or faculty of will. To it we 
take no exception. The third is the same as volition, 
but in an authoritative form as a command. The fourth 
and fifth, as wish, and the thing wished for ; both of 
which are now rarely used. The sixth and last, except 
the legal will, is power to control or determine, which 



Definitions and Illnstratio?is. 281 

is marked rare or obsolete. — (Webster's Unabridged 
Lex. 1864). This last we would place first and chief, 
as really expressing what the human soul possesses as 
an executive faculty. 

Admitting the irregularities and difficulties of the verb, 
we scarcely see the necessity of presenting it both as 
transitive and intransitive, when the same definitions are 
given to both. We accept the intransitive as correct. 
It means, as Webster says — 1. To exercise an act 
of volition. 2. To be inclined or disposed to desire, and 
instead of "to choose" we insert " to wish." And 3, 
to decide, to determine, to decree. The 4th, to order or 
direct by testament, is peculiar, and apart from our 
present purpose. 

The business of the psychologist differs from that of 
the lexicographer. It is the task of the latter to present 
to the public the various meanings attached to the words 
by society, learned or ordinary. It is the duty of the 
former, in his use of terms, to show what is the 
natural and correct expression of the mental feeling, 
conception, or volition. It may at once be seen that 
the first and third meanings of the verb " to will" given 
above, may be thrown into one ; for what is a volition 
but a decision or determination in some form or for some 
object ? and what is a decision or determination but a 
volition or exercise of the power of will respecting any 
particular subject or object. We have thus reduced the 
definitions to two — to decide or determine, by an act of 
volition, and to be inclined to, to desire, to wish. May 
they not be reduced to one ? The act of the will is one, 
but we cannot always mould language to suit our wishes. 
It would be well in some respects if one word conveyed 
but one definite meaning ; it should never convey con- 
s 



282 Christian Psychology : 

tradictory meanings ; but in the expansion and variety 
of thought, terms are pressed into service to convey 
diversities of meanings. As a matter of fact, the English 
verb " to will " does convey at present these two very- 
distinct meanings to desire or wish, and to determine or 
decide ; and as long as the present translation of the 
English Bible is in * use, or the phrases remain in which 
this verb occurs in it, so long will these two meanings 
hold their ground. It is not because they simply have 
a place in that book, for terms in it are now obsolete ; 
but because they both occur in so many phrases, that 
they are likely to retain a permanent footing in the 
language. Yet we cannot hide from our minds the fact 
that our language is still undergoing changes, and that 
now, in common conversation " wish," " desire," or 
" pleasure," takes the place of the former " will." We 
now say, "if you wish," " if you please," or "if you 
desire," rather than " if you will." The term "will " is 
coming to be regarded as the proper expression for 
positive volition or determination, as distinguished from 
inclination or wish ; and the day may come when it 
shall be dropped from the inspired volume in all those 
place where wish, desire, or pleasure, is the proper sub- 
stitute, and retained only where distinct determination 
is involved. If we can find a term to express a distinct 
act of will, in which no special element of feeling or 
thought is naturally or necessarily involved, we ought to 
select that term, and adhere to it in systematic com- 
position, to the exclusion of less definite terms. For this 
reason we exclude " wish " or " desire," from a correct 
definition of the act or the faculty of the will, because 
although the will is often concurrent with the desire, it 
is not always ; and when it is, the emotion is paramount. 



Definitions and Illustrations. 283 

For the same reason, we reject choice as a proper 
definition, because the intellectual power of distinction 
is equally prominent with "will," in an effect which may 
be said to have a compound cause. The term which we 
prefer as definite, decisive, and free from any peculiar 
element of feeling or special intellectual faculty, is deter- 
mination. To will is to determine. The will is the 
faculty by which we determine. An act of the will is a 
determination. To define more fully : 

The will is that faculty of the human spirit by which 
man determines to think, speak, or act on, or respecting 
any subject or object, in any manner, or at any time felt 
or judged right, proper, or necessary. It may be said 
that here either feeling or judgment is involved. We 
admit it ; but no special feeling nor any particular intel- 
lectual exercise in paramount or equally prominent 
influence. We do not pretend to separate feeling or 
intellect from the acts of the will. So far from that, we 
represent the will as influenced to action by both feeling 
and intellect. But in selecting a term to define " will," 
we wish to eliminate as far as we can emotional and 
intellectual action. We introduce the one or the other, 
only when we give in extenso the influencing cause 
of determination. 

Is it necessary to illustrate will ? Behold the works 
of creation ! They are the offspring of divine determina- 
tion. Behold the works of civilization ! They are the 
doings of the human will. Hear the myriad tongues of 
human intelligence ! They are the voices of will. See 
the multiform products of intellect and art ! They are 
the effects of will — steady, patient, persevering will. 

When and how does our will first act ? The infant is 
seen exercising his will to move a limb that may be 
resting uneasily or suffering pain. Feeling prompts to 



284 Christian Psychology : 

action. That action is preceded by volition ! Again an 
overflow of muscular power operates in the same way. 
Being refreshed by nature's best food, there is a stimu- 
lus to action from the very fulness of the vesicular tissue. 
Here also feelings move to exercise. The will is con- 
current. But let months roll on ; an object of attractive 
colour meets the eye ; action follows ; the hand is 
stretched out to grasp it. Here there is something more 
than feeling. A conception or imagination of something 
desirable is formed in the mind, and the will has in this 
case obeyed the intellect. When time is no longer 
counted by months but years, the mind or intellect 
with the emotions, more and more directs the move- 
ments of the will, although animal appetites exercise 
their full power, chiefly at regular seasons. When 
intelligence has become a directing power in youth, 
conscience is felt exerting its influence, and thereafter 
through life makes its authority tell with decided force 
on many of the decisions of the will. 

If intellect and conscience, as well as the emotional 
nature, have so much influence in controlling the will, 
how inadequate is that definition of " will " given in 
Chambers' Cyclopaedia, vol. 10, where it is said: "Will 
is defined, action prompted by feeling." In following out 
this definition, which appears to be in keeping with the 
theories of Bain, as the reader is directed to his work 
on " The Emotions and the Will," three facts are said to 
concur in forming " the collective aptitudes of the will." 
The first is termed " spontaneous activity "; the second, 
" a tendency to abide in agreeable action and to abandon 
disagreeable action " ; the third is " the operation of the 
retentive power of the mind in joining together by a 
permanent association movements and feelings that have 
existed together for some time." In plain terms, this 



Definitions and Illustrations. 285 

simply means that will is the product of feeling, and is 
in keeping with the strong materialistic tendencies of a 
certain school of modern philosophers. What is here 
said of the will would entirety agree with the doctrine 
that the soul is merely animated matter, prompted by 
animal life and sustained by acquired habits or -habi- 
tudes. In the infant, doubtless, animal life is specially 
prominent, but not always so, for temper or passion is 
often seen to have a controlling influence over the will for 
a time, and a certain stubbornness is shewn which the 
soothing influence of the mother may not for a time over- 
come. Here clearly there is will, and will controlled by 
something outside of muscular feeling, viz., an emotional 
nature capable of pride, envy, and anger, even at that 
early stage of existence. Spontaneous activity does not 
belong to the will by itself, but belongs to animal life, and 
specially to the human soul. The seeming spontaneous 
activity of the body is merely the activity of the soul 
working through or by the body as its machine or 
instrument. The sensations of pleasure or pain do cer- 
tainly influence the will, and properly. These feelings 
are intended to conserve what is useful or good, and to 
terminate what is felt to be injurious or destructive. 
We withdraw our hand suddenly from what is felt to 
pierce it, and we continue the hand after being cold on 
what is felt to be soft and warm. In both cases the will 
is engaged in conserving the body, its agent. Feeling, 
doubtless, is the main ingredient in directing the will in 
such cases, though intellect is not wholly excluded. 
But we can easily conceive the removal of the hand, as 
the result not simply of feeling, but chiefly of perception. 
The hand has touched a circular saw in rapid motion. 
There is no contact as yet with the teeth of the saw, but 
the touch of the cold steel has awakened the attention 



286 Christian Psychology : 

of the mind, the eye is directed to the spot, when the 
imminent danger of the hand is instantly perceived, 
and with the velocity of lightning the order flies from 
the will to remove the hand. Mere feeling would 
not call for immediate removal, for no wound was 
yet given, but intelligence moved the will to instant 
action. The third " fact " amounts to this : that 
habit sways the will. This is true within a certain 
range ; but what a vast array of operations, and 
many of these of the noblest and most important 
character, lie beyond the range of habit. A man is 
called suddenly to dare or die for his country, or for a 
fellow man in extreme danger. Is it mere feeling that 
leads him to the field of battle, or prompts him to 
spring to the rescue of the perishing ? Is it pleasure or 
pain ? or is it the power of retention in the mind, linking 
old associations together ? We give to feeling its place, 
but we also allow to high and noble thoughts, to a per- 
ception of what is right, to a conviction of duty, the 
controlling power in directing the will in many such 
exertions. Emotion in such cases, as fear of death, 
might overbalance love of country or sympathy with 
the suffering ; but convictions of duty, of what is 
becoming and right as a citizen and as a man, bear 
down fear and all opposing emotions, and direct the 
will in the effort or enterprise. Hence we regard 
Bain's account of the development, education, or "apti- 
tudes" of will, as well as his definition of it, as radically 
defective. Man is not a mere animal, but in his true 
normal actions exhibits a will regulated by noblest con- 
ceptions of right and duty. 

In the efforts of the aspiring student, we often see the 
power of will. He is endeavouring to translate a lan- 
guage foreign to him, or to grasp a mathematical problem. 



Deftn itious and Illnstra tions. 287 

Difficulties are not mastered by a mere wish. For 
consecutive hours he bends all his intellectual power 
to overcome the obscurity, to find his way through the 
obstructions that beset his path. What a relief when 
the obscurity has vanished, and a good and appropriate 
meaning has been obtained, or the problem is solved by 
the discovery of a high-way through the intellectual 
puzzle ! Here the intellect has first guided the will to 
the work to be done, and when that is determined upon, 
the will employs the intellect in the performance of the 
work. How resolute is that will when the work to be 
done is the deciphering of ancient inscriptions without 
a key ! How long have men toiled over mysteries, the 
will keeping them like slaves to their task, and itself the 
agent of entrenched convictions or aspirations ! In 
ponderous works of literature, such as elaborate com- 
mentories on extensive writings, we have the labours oj 
a lifetime. There the will has directed the employment 
of the intellectual faculties, with a steadiness which has 
acquired the force of habit. The will, however, is but 
the exponent of the acquired mental character. Certain 
convictions, desires, or aspirations, as motives have 
secured a firm hold in the soul, and they control the 
will. To change the will, you must change their hold 
of the mind. Relax their grasp or displace them, and 
the will responds to the change. For example, the close 
application may be exhausting the strength of the body, 
for " much study is a weariness to the flesh," and the 
system may be craving for relief or a change by a 
feeling of weakness or pain in more than one place. 
Against this is the conviction of duty that the work must 
be done, or the desire to see it accomplished as a monu- 
ment of intellect, or the aspiration for fame expected to 



288 Christian Psychology : 

follow, may press for a continued application. The 
opposing forces may be for a time balanced, during 
which the work is suspended until one prevails, as seen 
in the resumption of the work or the abandonment of 
the study for a time. 

In speech the will exhibits its highest power in courts 
of justice and halls of legislation. What efforts to make 
some things plain, and to mystify and conceal other 
things, are sometimes heard in courts of justice ! At 
times what lengthened speeches of accusation, defence, 
or judicial summary extending over days, until the ears 
are weary of hearing, and the tongue of moving. The 
will literally holds the tongue, so that the youthful 
admonition, "hold your tongue " — although not polite 
in modern conversation — is not far from the truth of 
nature. In criminal cases, or civil cases involving great 
issues, there is a holding that is a controlling of the 
tongue by the will in a very marked manner, often seen 
in the witness box. And with what pains will the 
advocate, highly talented and deeply interested in a 
case, set forth what he conceives to be the just view of 
the matter under consideration. On such occasions one 
might conceive, on gazing on the earnest pleader, and 
noticing the various turns of argument and illustration, 
that there was an " I " over the head of the will, super- 
vising and directing it ; but the simple truth is that it is 
the soul, in its power of introspection and retrospection, 
searching for stored up arguments and illustrations, 
while the will keeps up the steady stream of discourse. 

When a constitutional debate occurs in Parliament 
on a question of some moment, powers of speech of an 
extraordinary character testify to the strength of will. 
Men speak for four, five, or six hours continuously, 



Definitions and Illustrations. ' 289 

when what are called the powers of nature begin to give 
signs of exhaustion. The intellect may seem wearied : 
but it is more likely that the material organs will show 
the first symptoms of exhaustion. In every effort, but 
particularly in such extreme effort, the will appears in 
the fore-front directing and sustaining the intellectual 
struggle through the organs of voice, and often of gesture 
or action. 

Man is a worker. In the open field or in the work- 
shop, on the sea or in the mine he is a son of toil ; and 
everywhere the will is the exponent of his energy. But 
it is in stubborn contest with opposition that the tenacity 
of will is seen. Watch the steady struggle of the rowers 
contending against wind and tide in a heavy sea. The 
task seems hopeless. But they tug at the oars ; they 
stick to the task ; they strain even- muscle ; for the 
will is resolute that the shore shall be reached, and 
death avoided if human strength can accomplish it. 
See the furious battle for a position of importance in a 
vast engagement between armies. It may be taken and 
retaken, as was the key of the battle-field of Waterloo. 
Or it ma}- be held without surrender for a moment with 
the most undaunted heroism, although its defenders 
have been reduced to one-fourth their numbers. There 
is an obstinacy of character which is but another name 
for a stiffness of will, which may or may not be service- 
able to a man. If a man is right he should hold to it ; 
but if wrong, his obstinacy renders his improvement 
doubly difficult. Men will sometimes cling to a project 
which is utterly hopeless. This is folly. It may be a 
crime. Tenacity of purpose is good, but let us be open 
to the convictions of sound reason or valid experience. 
The will of the autocrat has wrought much mischief — 



290 Christian Psychology : 

but sometimes it has achieved great marvels. When 
men get entangled in their own meshes it requires some 
strong spirit represented by the will to cut the knot. 
There are evils now preying upon society, such as 
intemperance and war, which await some powerful 
will, when one year will accomplish what a century of 
negotiation and moral suasion will not do. There are 
moral evils afflicting this earth which await the advent 
of some strong wills, in other words of some strong 
spirits which will reorganize some church organizations 
and cast the leaven of corruption into the fire of 
universal condemnation. The will is but the collected 
and directed energy of the spirit finding expression in 
thought, speech, and action, and ought to be regulated 
by forethought, prudence, purity of feeling, and an 
enlightened conscience. 



Relation of the Will to Morality. 291 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

RELATION OF THE WILL TO MORALITY. 

What is morality ? It is the relation of any thought, 
feeling, purpose, state, or act to a supposed or given 
law of rectitude. What relation does the human will 
bear to morality or to relation to law ? — So extensive 
that morality extends so far and no farther than the 
domain of will in its passive concurrence or active 
direction. But is accountability co-extensive with 
morality ? — No ; for there may be morality that is, a 
character or act, beyond the domain of accountability. 
An insane man may perform many acts, and acquire a 
character by these acts, which having a direct relation 
to laws human and divine, are embraced by morality, 
and yet accountability is wanting, for the intellect is 
obstructed in its natural operations through a diseased 
or disordered brain. There is morality where there is 
operation of will in the indulgence of feeling, or in the 
formation of character, or in the performance of an act 
in conformity with or in opposition to a proper rule of 
rectitude. A deed may not have been intended by the 
doer, yet there is morality in the act, for the will is in 
it, and thus the man is in it, and there is a measure of 
responsibility connected with it according to the cul- 
pable ignorance or carelessness of the doer. Hence we 
are not prepared to accept the statement of Dr. Hodge 
that where there is no intention there is no morality. 



292 Christian Psychology : 

He says : " If I kill a man, unless the act was inten- 
tentional, i.e., the result of a volition to kill or injure, 
there is no morality in the act." — (Theo., vol. 2, p. 304.) 
The deed has certainly a relation to law, and therefore 
comes within the range of morality. The will was in 
the act, though without that end or issue in view. 
Every deed must have a doer. If the man is not forced 
by his limbs being used by another, if he acts volun- 
tarily the deed is his own. If his limbs or hands are 
employed by another, the deed is the act of the other 
who employed his limbs or hands. In the case sup- 
posed the act was the man's own, but it was not 
intended. Is there no morality in it because it was not 
intended ? Suppose a man firing a rifle. He aims at a 
bird perched on a tree near a highway. Persons are 
passing along unnoticed by the man who carries the 
rifle. The ball misses the bird and shoots one of the 
passers by. He did not intend to shoot the fellow- 
mortal, but a bird ; but is there no morality in the act ? 
The killing of a man without being required by self- 
defence, or judicial process or war, or any way recog- 
nised as lawful by the laws of God or man, is a wrong 
or a crime. But does the want of intention exclude it 
from all the classes of acts ruled or controlled by law ? 
We think not. The man is not a murderer, he has been 
guilty of the deed by accident. But he has done injury, 
great injury — what is in itself wrong, decidedly wrong, 
though unintentionally. There may be circumstances 
to aggravate the deed, not only in respect of the person 
killed, but from the carelessness and disregard of admo- 
nition exhibited by the doer. If the idea should go 
abroad that there is no morality in any act which a man 
does not intend, the consciences of many wrongdoers 



Relation of the Will to Morality. 293 

would have a balm for their wounds. A thousand evil 
deeds are the result of carelessness, not one of which 
may be intended. Recently through what appears to 
be sheer carelessness a steamer ran into an emigrant 
vessel at anchor, occasioning a loss of 300 lives. Who 
could suppose the act of the man at the wheel of the 
steamer to be intentional — yet it was the occasion of the 
loss of so many valuable lives, and was in all probability 
the result of carelessness. Is there no morality — no 
transgression of law — in this wholesale slaughter, 
because not intended ? Want of intention in respect 
to the actual result, implies want of knowledge of the 
result about to take place. The ignorance extenuates 
the guilt. If the ignorance is culpable, the guilt is 
greater, the extenuation less. If the result could not be 
foreseen, as in experimenting with machinery, and all 
known precautions had been used to avoid disaster, 
then the result, though the death of one or more men, 
is a pure accident so called, which may be deplored, 
but for which no special blame can be attached to any 
one. It is clear then that there are deeds which, not 
intended, are yet highly blameworthy and therefore 
within the range of morality, and it is equally clear that 
there are results of voluntary acts which, not intended, 
are pure accidents, to which guilt cannot be attached, 
however much they ma}- be deplored, which are in the 
.abstract within the range of morality, but beyond the 
range of culpability. Hence we distinguish not only 
between morality and accountability, but also between 
accountability and culpability. A man may be the 
doer of a moral act, that is an act of which in itself the 
moral laws of God and man take cognizance, but not 
be accountable for it, the man being insane ; and a 



294 Christian Psychology : 

perfectly sane man may be the doer of the same act, 
viewed by itself, for which he is accountable, but for 
which no culpability attaches to him, the deed being 
wholly unforeseen, a pure accident so called, and one 
which none deplores more than the unfortunate doer of 
it. Sins of ignorance are moral acts, not intended, but 
they are still sins for which God holds a man account- 
able, and to some extent culpable, according to the light 
attainable by the evil-doer. Saul of Tarsus, when 
putting to death the followers of Jesus, did not intend to 
dishonour the God of Israel or trample on all his laws, 
but he did so in his ignorance, and was justly held both 
accountable and culpable. His ignorance extenuated his 
guilt, but could not wholly remove it; there was morality 
of a very pronounced type in his cruel deeds, which were 
the manifestations of a very violent rebellion against 
God, which however was very far from his intention. 

On the question under consideration Dr. M'Cosh says 
(Div. Gov., p. 309) : " We regard the will as the seat of 
all virtue and vice ; " and again, page 310: " We main- 
tain, then, that there can be neither virtue nor vice where 
there is no exercise of the will. There is nothing for 
example meritorious" — (and we suppose the opposite) — 
11 in the mere exercise of the intellectual faculties." 
Before commenting on these extracts, we wish to remark 
that it is often extremely difficult to avoid dropping some 
sentences on such intricate subjects to which no exception 
could be taken, and which may appear inconsistent with 
other sentences not far removed from them. M'Cosh is 
specially open to this remark. And when we are con- 
strained to differ from him or others, we wish to do so 
with a sense of equal or greater liability to err. But it 
is by the detection of mistakes and the proved establish- 



Relation of the Will to Morality. 295 

ment of truth that the science of mind can make advances 
which may be regarded as permanent. If we take the 
scope of several pages our views may not differ much 
from the author under consideration ; but there are 
emphatic sentences, like the above quoted, to which we 
cannot agree without modification and explanation. 
When it is said that the will is the seat of all virtue and 
vice, we suppose the meaning to be that all virtue and 
vice rest there, and rise from there. Such are the pur- 
poses of a seat. Now what is the essence of the will 
but power, force, in which resides neither virtue nor 
vice. True, that power is inseparable from intelligence 
and feeling in all accountable beings. But it is because 
the doings of the will are the outgoings of power, indis- 
solubly united to intelligence, feeling, and conscience, 
that they are virtuous or the opposite. They are not so, 
simply as doings of the will, but as doings of a will 
conjoined with these qualities or faculties. Is it right 
then to say that the will is the seat of all virtue and vice? 
Is not the seat of virtue, or its opposite, the soul, with its 
attributes of responsibility ? So far from the will being 
the seat of virtue or vice, it is the exponent of an anterior 
or inner virtue or vice. It puts out in shape or form 
what it has received from the other faculties of the soul, 
and is therefore the manifestation of virtue or vice rather 
than its seat. The second extract shows that we are not 
misunderstanding our author. He says that there is 
nothing meritorious in the mere exercise of the intel- 
lectual faculties. Now we know that no faculty of the 
intellect can be brought to work or kept at work without 
the will. If the sentence has any meaning it must be 
that the employment of the intellect, that is with the 
will, without which there is no employment, has nothing 



296 Christian Psychology : 

meritorious. To this we do not subscribe. Taking the 
ordinary sense of the word meritorious, as good, praise- 
worthy, is it not good, praiseworthy, or meritorious to 
employ the intellect in the study of the works or word 
of God ? True, the will is in it, for the will is in every 
voluntary movement of mind or body, but the intellect is 
the chief worker, and so far as we can speak of " the 
mere exercise of the intellectual faculties," they are at 
work and no other. As an improvement of the mind 
and a storing of it with precious knowledge, is not that 
exercise praiseworthy, that is " meritorious." On the 
other hand, may not the intellect be employed in 
its " mere exercise" in perusing the most vicious publi- 
cations, or plotting base stratagems, or indulging a foul 
imagination, and so debasing and degrading the soul ? 
It may be asked, " Where is the seat of this perversion 
of intellect ? " We answer by asking " Where is the seat 
of sin ? " — Not certainly in mere power or force viewed 
abstractly, therefore not in the will by itself as a faculty 
of the soul. The seat of sin is the soul viewed as a 
whole, and specially, we apprehend, in its emotional sus- 
ceptibility, operating on the one hand in the darkening 
and perversion of the intellect, and on the other in the 
darkening and perversion of conscience, the will being 
the true exponent as the working power of the three great 
functional departments. What this author has affirmed 
of the mere exercise of the intellect, he affirms in the 
same page of " mere emotion." Now, is there anything 
to be gained by affirming that mere emotion has neither 
virtue nor vice in it ? Is there no virtue in love, as in 
supreme love to God ? Is there no vice in hatred, as the 
hatred of everything good ? There is virtue in the one, 
for it is the fulfilling of the law ; and there is vice in the 



Relation of the J Vill to Morality. 297 

other, for it is a transgression of the law. Yet both are 
emotions. But are they mere emotions ? They cer- 
tainly have in such stages a concurring will ; but they 
are the leading power in the soul at the time ; they 
influence the will in any movements of attachment to 
the object loved or in aversion to the objects hated. 
Thus far the emotional nature may be said to be the seat 
of virtue or vice, rather than the will. We admit at once 
that there is no morality or immorality attributable to 
any individual in which the will has not a part, but that 
part may be a concurrent part as well as a directing part. 
But the soul, as a whole, and not the mere will, is the seat 
of morality ; and while it is such, its intellect may be at 
one time the prominent agent, at another time the 
emotional nature ; and in both cases the will may be 
found concurring rather than leading. When purposes, 
resolutions, or determinations on any moral question are 
called for, the will appears in prominence as the expo- 
nent of intellect or feeling, or of both combined. The 
same is true when moral deeds are to be performed. 
The will is the executive faculty of the soul, the doing 
power, revealing by its determinations and its actings the 
moral nature of the soul, as that is exhibited through the 
views and feelings of the intellect and emotional nature. 
If this is correct, it must be improper to represent the 
will as the seat of all virtue and vice, when it is but the 
concurrent or actively prominent agent of an anterior or 
inner influence possessed of the true moral character. 

Similarly inaccurate, we apprehend, is the definition of 
the will given in a work recently published in this city by 
a late acute and vigorous thinker. He says : " The 
power of volition is the power which makes the mind 
moral ; or it is the moral power of the mind" (Quaiffe's 

T 



298 Christian Psychology : 

Intellectual Sciences, vol. I, p. 49), modifying this 
definition on a subsequent page (53), he says : " The 
will is man's moral nature, taken in connection with the 
functional power of thought." The two sentences first 
quoted are not the same in meaning. The power which 
makes moral, and the moral power, can scarcely be 
said to be equivalent expressions. The power which 
makes the mind moral is not the will or the mere power 
of volition. It is essential to active morality ; but there 
are other essentials which form the chief ingredients of 
a moral nature. We see will — powerful, obstinate will 
— in the brute creation, where there is no moral nature. 
Witness the obstinate horse which cannot be forced 
across the bridge, or the stubborn ox that will not draw 
in the yoke. The power which made the mind moral 
is the author of our being ; but the powers which con- 
stitute a moral nature are intelligence, feeling, and 
conscience, attended with the power of displaying and 
directing each of these endowments or faculties, which 
power we call "Will." We cannot, therefore, accept the 
second sentence that the will is " the moral power of 
the mind." It exhibits by its volitions or actions 
the moral nature of the mind good or bad, but it is 
not in itself the moral power. It is power, but power 
displayed in mathematics or mechanics, where there is 
no element of morality, as well as in moral actions or 
volitions. Hence it is not accurate to define it as the 
moral power of the mind, as if morality rested in it, 
which is the idea of the author. Morality is displayed 
through it, and so far it may be called a moral power, 
as the instrumental cause, the active prominent agent, 
but the morality of the soul, and its adaptation to moral 
actions lie beyond the will, the former in the acquired 



Relation of the Will to Morality. 299 

character, and the latter in the spiritual endowments 
formerly mentioned. In the quotation from page 53, 
the author unites with the will " the functional power of 
thought" to make up "man's moral nature." This is 
nearer what we apprehend as the truth, but defective in 
giving the first place to the will, and in associating with 
it only intelligence. Man's emotional nature has much 
to do with morality. His loves and his hates, his hopes 
and his fears go far to form character, and the character 
of an intelligent responsible being is the manifestation 
of his moral nature. Then his conscience occupies the 
chief place in his moral constitution, as approving or 
disapproving actions or thoughts regarded as having a 
relation to law. We must not, therefore, allow the will, 
because of its prominence in action, to conceal from our 
minds the nature beneath it, of which it is the active 
exponent. Thus the review of opinions in which authors 
seem to have misapprehended the true nature of the 
subject under consideration, affords an opportunity of 
bringing out, by way of contrast or distinction, what 
are conceived to be the true ideas of that subject. 

The will, then, has a vital connection with morality, 
both mediately and immediately ; that is, with acts called 
accidents, in which a voluntary agent was one of the 
operating causes in results not designed or contemplated, 
and in intellectual pursuits and emotional states in 
which it holds a concurring or subordinate part ; and 
in determinations and actions in which summoning all 
the powers of the soul as subservient to itself, it dis- 
plays immediately, prominently and directly, the moral 
nature of the man. It is not correctly called the seat of 
morality or of virtue and vice, for the soul, with the 
constitutional endowments of intelligence, feeling, and 



300 Christian Psychology : 

conscience, with will, is that seat, but it is the chief 
exponent of the morality which is in man, by concur- 
ring with other faculties or in taking the lead of some 
or all of them. 

Thus we have endeavoured to thread our way through 
the thicket, in which so many have been -puzzled and 
bewildered. We have noticed the opinions of other 
writers on this important subject with feelings of respect, 
as explorers who have preceded us with less light, 
it may be, than we have had. We have examined 
theories of the will in respect to its determining power, 
whether that power rested in itself as a separate faculty, 
or in the faculties external to itself in the soul, and have 
been constrained to believe that the will is determined 
by the judgment, feelings, conscience, or character of 
the soul, and cannot be self-determined. We have seen 
that liberty belongs to the agent, the man, rather than to 
the will ; that the will is swayed more or less strongly 
or steadily by the prevailing impressions and judgments, 
or by the settled habits of the man ; and that his ability 
varies according to the condition of the man or the state 
of the soul, and is not to be confounded with the freedom 
or liberty of the man as expressed by his will. We 
have glanced at the shades of thought, feeling, and 
determination, as expressed in the oldest written records 
in the possession of man, as they bore on the action 
of will in the human soul, and have, in addition to 
many casual declarations of the meaning of will, given 
our own formal definition, attended with a few illus- 
trations as exhibited in thought, speech, and action. 
And we have closed with a brief notice of a question of 
great importance, the relation of will to morality. We 
hope that the way in which this last question has been 



Relation of the Will to Morality. 301 

handled ma)- simplify the subject and strip it of much 
of its vagueness or ambiguity. The will in this matter 
is but the inner man showing himself; and his doings, 
which come under the cognizance of law, may be traced 
from the prominent agent to the impelling nature lying 
beneath which in part may at times show itself side by 
side with will in exercises both of intellect and feeling, 
and specially of conscience. 

It is hoped that the unity and simplicity of these 
sentiments on this complicated subject may aid its 
comprehension, and contribute to a settlement of 
opinion on this important department of mental science. 



302 Christian Psychology : 



DEPARTMENT IV. 



THE NORMAL FACULTY. 
CHAPTER XXXV. 

SELF-REGULATION IN THE WORKS OF GOD 

One of the most distinguishing features in the perfection 
of the works of God is their possession of self-regula- 
ting powers, where motion, change, and freedom are 
required. Where nature is inanimate the regulation is 
effected by the combination of the various powers and 
properties of different bodies. Where nature is animate 
the self-regulating capacity is the possession, as is meet, 
of each animate being. Yet in no case is one creature 
seen absolutely independent of all others. But the 
dependence is diminished as the creature rises in the 
scale of being from the inanimate to the highest grade 
of intelligence. 

The co-operative mechanism of a clock or steam- 
engine is justly considered a triumph of human ingenuity. 
There is riot only a neat and accurate adaptation of one 
part to another, and such an adjustment of parts that 
one may exercise a lever force, when set in motion, on 
another, but an application of power in such a way as to 
necessitate an even and regular exercise of force, while 
the power is restricted in measure and range within 



Self-Regulation in the Works of God. 303 

carefully defined limits. Now if the first mentioned 
piece of mechanism were so constructed that while its 
force is being - expended in its appropriate work, it also 
impelled a supplementary apparatus in the form, it may 
be, of an air pump, which husbanded a force sufficient, 
at the right moment, before the spring was exhausted, 
by the simple touch of a lever, to rewind the clock to 
repeat with perfect accuracy the work of the past, we 
would have a self-regulating machine which would con- 
tinue to work till its pivots or cranks or levers wore out. 
This would be an approximation to the perfection of 
God's works in their self-regulating- powers. But the 
inferiority of man's work would soon become apparent 
in the lack of self-restoring power. Man requires to 
repair his machinery from the results of tear and wear ; 
and to retard that wear by preventing friction through 
repeated supplies of oil. Here the master spirit becomes 
apparent. The Fountain of skill has so constructed his 
works that they are self- restoring within the limits pre- 
scribed for their operations, their joints being steadily 
oiled, and their waste being replaced, so that they are 
both self-regulating and in their own sphere self-restoring. 
Let us glance at some of these arrangements. 

It was necessary that this earth should be watered. 
Where shall the water be obtained, and how shall it be 
done, and how shall the supply be kept up ? The ocean 
is the great reservoir, but it is salt, and who shall lift it 
up and spread it on the land, if fresh. How marvellous 
the divine arrangement. The earth shall be watered on 
a scale equal to its demands. Its dryness shall present 
its request. The ocean shall respond by its evaporation. 
The process shall take the moisture and leave the salt. 
The vapours shall seek the land from their very coolness 



304 Christian Psychology : 

— the mountains shall arrest them — the condensed vapour 
shall descend in drops over hundreds of miles and refresh 
the parched land. Nothing is lost. What the earth 
does not need is sent back to the ocean, or raised again 
in vapour to the clouds. The land cries to the sea and 
sky, and is answered with rain ; and the sea and sky cry 
for a return to the earth, and are answered by rushing 
rivers and steaming vapours. Thus the circle moves 
round in perfect harmony under natural laws. 

It was necessary that the atmosphere of this earth 
should be kept in motion that its vital qualities might be 
preserved, and yet that this motion should be varied, 
and not be always in one direction ; and also moderate, 
as violent motion would be the destruction of man, 
animals, and vegetation. How shall this varied motion 
within due control be permanently maintained ? Cold 
and heat, gravitation, the action of the sun, electricity 
and the rotation of the earth on its axis, shall all blend 
their powers in harmony to keep up this health-giving 
circulation. No rectification from the creating hand 
seems needed. The arrangements were perfect when 
the work was begun. If the air has to be cooled, a cooling 
apparatus is under preparation, whilst the extraordinary 
heat is progressing. The heat is, in truth, preparing a 
cooler. If wind is needed to dry off damp vapours, cold 
and heat are both in store ready for the moment of 
action. The one will congeal into snow, the other dissi- 
pate into invisible mist ; and both the one and other 
will be attended by wind. If the wind blows long from 
one quarter it is at the same time preparing agencies 
which shall reverse the current. If noxious gases are 
collecting which would destroy life, chemical substances 
are also forming and combining which will consume or 



Self-Regulation in the Works of God. 305 

explode and dissipate these foul gases. Thus mar- 
vellously does change with order walk the surface of the 
earth, and mount the higher regions of the air. 

It was necessary that this earth, as the abode of man, 
endowed with a material frame, should have a succes- 
sion of light and darkness, that both should come and 
retire gradually, that they should be universal and 
permanent. How was this to be effected ? Shall two 
great lights be kindled and extinguished, one on each 
side of the globe, every twenty-four hours ? Not so ; 
one luminary shall perform the task, and it shall not 
need to be even shaded, much less extinguished. The 
object to be illumined shall be set a whirling, on such a 
principle and with such a speed that its motion shall be 
incessant, and its rotation completed in the prescribed 
time. The illuminator shall be of sufficient size, and at 
a sufficient distance, to illumine thoroughly and per- 
petually the whole face of the earth turned towards it, 
and that only. Then the conditions are that the one 
body retain its fixed position and illumining power, and 
the other retain its distance and regular rotatory power. 
What are the facts ? The sun is stationary so far as the 
system of which it is the centre is concerned. Its 
illumining power is kept up undiminished from age to 
age by, as we may suppose, an incessant consumption 
and precipitation of gases in its atmosphere. They 
rise and fall in endless circle. The gases of our 
globe, in all their changings, are indestructible. And 
the distance assigned to our earth is the exact posi- 
tion for which its gravity fits it, so that its centrifugal 
force is fairly balanced by the attraction of the sun, 
thereby securing to it its proper place, and with that 
its proper measure of light ; and the original rotatory 



306 Christian Psychology : 

velocity given to it remains undiminished, being 
incessantly sustained by the action of gravitation in 
the annual revolution round the central luminary. 
Here, then, is marvellous order, exact balancing of 
powers, and incessant self-regulation, by the combina- 
tion of different forces and of different motions. Day 
succeeds night, and night succeeds day in perfect 
silence, with exact time, with even speed ; and that not by 
by some invisible hand raising and depressing from day 
to day a celestial luminary, but by material orbs per- 
forming those offices, exerting those powers, and accom- 
plishing those motions assigned them in creation by the 
great Architect. 

When we touch the domain of life, we touch on 
mystery. Even vegetable life is inscrutable. We can- 
not measure it or weigh it as a current of magnetism 
or the sparks of electricity — we cannot produce it. A 
seed lies before us, apparently a dead mass. But if 
uninjured, life lies entombed in it. Place it where the 
chemical powers of heat, earth, and moisture may reach 
it, and that life awakes as from a sleep, and it strikes 
downward to receive a permanent supply of nourish- 
ment, and strikes upward to seek extension, develop- 
ment, and fructification. It is not simply force, for 
force once expended cannot renew itself. It is not 
an explosion as of gas, or a slower expansion, as of 
carbon. To describe it as force is simply to speak of 
its operation, leaving itself unknown. It is an inscrutable 
something with strong chemical instincts, by which 
it seeks nourishment, obtains strength, grows, often 
amazingly, although generally a fixture to the soil of 
earth, and reaches fructification by which its kind is 
perpetuated and spread abroad. Dig and delve and pry 



Self- Regulation in the Works of God. 307 

as you may, there is something beyond that eludes your 
mental grasp. The protoplasm of the materialist will 
not solve the difficulty. There is carbonic acid and 
water and ammonia in the plant, but there is something 
more. An electric spark passing through hydrogen and 
oxygen gas may produce water ; but any amount of elec- 
tricity passing through or dwelling in carbonic acid, 
water and ammonia in any quantities, will not produce 
a living plant. The life is not light, nor heat, nor 
electricity, however much any of these may be essen- 
tial to the development of life. It is humbling to 
man to have to confess that there is a something ever 
before his eyes, the nature of which he cannot compre- 
hend. He cannot put his finger on any one substance, 
and say, " that is vegetable life." He may say of this or 
that seed, a grain of wheat or a bean, "there is vegetable 
life in that speck of matter," but what that life, now 
inert, is which may so soon expand in so many ways 
and forms, and develop wondrous power and beauty, he 
may not say, for he cannot understand. The germ of 
multitudinous forms, of power, instinct, sensibilities, and 
beauty, to us invisible and inscrutable, is seen and 
known by the Creator. To us belong the phenomena, 
and here we may luxuriate at will. 

Taking the plant as we find it, what manifestations of 
self-regulation can we discover? Its movements are 
regulated, *that is, directed and controlled by itself to the 
growth, nourishment, preservation, beauty and fructifi- 
cation of the plant. That it may grow it will seek for 
food in earth, air, and water, and absorb it when found. 
It will pass by what is deleterious or unfit for its nourish- 
ment, or rejected by its instincts, and stretch out its roots 
to touch the coveted earth or moisture, or its branches to 



308 Christian Psychology : 

reach the desired air or heat. It will lift up obstructions 
of stone or earth, it will split rocks, it will pierce through 
small cavities, it will climb lofty supports, or penetrate 
into great depths of soil to attain its appointed magnitude. 
It will spread its branches far and wide ; it will multiply 
its branchlets, and sub-divide these into countless twigs 
and sprouts, and expand the last into innumerable leaves 
that the air, warmth, and moisture of heaven may con- 
tribute to the development and maturity sought. For 
preservation it will store up water in its roots ; and when 
the time has come it will call up from its storehouses this 
water, in the form of sap, for further development, foliage 
and fructification. Its leaves will both shade and manure 
the roots. And when the plant seeks propagation how 
exquisite the arrangement and beauty often displayed. 
Where is the physical beauty that can excel the flowers 
of the field in the process of fructification ? If the seed 
requires protection it may be found surrounded by a hard 
covering, and that by a fleshy substance or a tough 
matting, the one to nourish the soil, the other to protect 
from fracture by a fall from the tree. If it must spread 
it may be found furnished with wings of down to 
bear it far and wide over the fields. Is not the plant 
marvellously self-contained ? Give it its appropriate soil 
and climate, and it wants no more. From its first dis- 
play of life till it dies, it requires no mortal hand to 
touch it, all its processes are carried on without human 
aid, until we behold its matured utility in timber, fruit 
or flowers. The art of man may remove obstructions, or 
propagate combinations, but in either case nature does 
the work, man can only facilitate the operations. He 
can feed and strengthen and train, but in every particle 
of development he must wait on nature and be a silent 



Self- Regulation in the Works of God. 309 

observer. And is not that work perfect after its kind ? 
Who can detail its marvels ? From the sprouting till -the 
life disappears in the root or the fruit, the incessant, 
varied, and complicated operations, which we may call 
chemical, are carried on unaided by any animated exist- 
ence, nature beneath, around and above furnishing the 
only material assistance required. 

When we advance to the animal kingdom the evi- 
dences of self-regulation become more clearly defined. 
The animal is complete in itself in respect to all the pur- 
poses of being. These purposes are attained through its 
nourishment, preservation and the perpetuation of the 
species. It was created to display the glory of the 
Creator, and to contribute its quota to the general welfare 
of animate existence. When formed, it required nutri- 
ment, protection, and a continued existence in its 
progeny. Food is provided, but the animal must seek 
it. As vegetable life was stationary, each plant was 
granted its appropriate soil. But as animals have as a rule 
the powers of locomotion, they are allowed to roam in 
search for food. As food is not brought to them, have 
they the needed instinct to guide them to appropriate 
nutriment and to the avoiding of what is injurious though 
apparently similar to the most nutritious ? They have an 
instinct vastly superior to any human direction or 
restraint. See the flocks of migratory birds moving over 
continents and isles at appropriate seasons in search of 
nourishment or for the rearing of their young ! See the 
shoals of fish that move into shallow waters where food 
may be found for themselves or for their spawn when 
hatched ! How they swarm into creeks, coves, bays and 
harbours in countless millions, all obeying the powerful 
instinct which the all-wise Creator implanted in them ! 



310 Christian Psychology : 

The greatest on land or in sea are guided in the same 
way. The whale resorts to its feeding ground where the 
food is found in greatest abundance at certain seasons — 
and the herds of buffaloes or elephants shift their quarters 
as the abundance or scarcity of grass or foliage may 
require. Nor are the insects less skilfully guided. See 
the ant, the wasp, or the. bee. When the food is flesh or 
grass, or fruit, or drops of liquid, the teeth or the tongue, 
or the trunk, or the claws, as well as the internal organs, 
are provided for it. When the animal is to become 
stationary, as the oyster, it is guided by instinct to adhere 
to such a place as is fitted to afford it nourishment in the 
watery currents that flow around it. Preservation is 
needed as well as nourishment. This is not absolute, for 
many are designed to perish, but it is comparative, 
securing ordinary safety and a necessary term of life to 
the species as a whole. How are they preserved ? Each 
has his element and his place of retreat. Wings are 
given to the bird to bear him away from the snare, the 
arrow, or the bullet ; fins to the fish to launch with 
amazing rapidity through the watery element which is its 
home, and where swiftness is denied, bony protection in 
weapons of defence or offence, or where either is denied 
the instinct strongly exhibited to elude the pursuer by 
concealment. To the antelope or deer is given the long 
slender limb that speed may be its security. To the lion 
or the bear are given the teeth and the power of jaw, the 
claws and the weight of paw that the antagonist may be 
both smitten down and torn to pieces. The insect and 
the serpent are furnished with their irritating or their 
deadly poison that the intruder or the foe may stand in 
dread of them ; and the sluggish crocodile is shielded by 
his coat of mail from the ordinary assault of the prowling 



Self- Regulation in the Works of God. 3 1 1 

panther. But the age of all is limited. If they are not 
to perish or to be re-created, they must be propagated. 
No unnecessary expenditure of power or skill is seen in 
the divine operations. The species are perpetuated in 
their offspring. In general the species are in duplicate — 
the male and his female. In their season they pair, and 
co-operate in building their nests, preparing their spawn- 
ing shoals, constructing their lairs, and where necessary 
rearing their young. In all this the most wonderful 
instinct is displayed. Truly they are self-regulated. 
One species does not guide or instruct another. Each 
selects its mate, chooses its own resting place, and 
watches over the young that need care with close solici- 
tude. When the grade of animal is low, as the Lamelli- 
branchiata, it may be hermaphrodite ; but even then the 
progeny is multitudinous. When the parent animal 
cannot look after the young, and the consequent loss is 
great, provision is made to meet this in the vast numbers 
of ova produced. But these are not cast out except 
where provision is made in some measure for their nutri- 
ment in the early stages of life. The herring spawns on 
the sandy bottom in the shallow lagoon, and the salmon 
on the pebbly bed of a running stream, where the ova 
of both, when hatched, may receive needed sustenance. 
All the requirements of being, amidst the endless variety 
of animal life, are met by the instinct implanted in each, 
and the bounties of Providence strewn within the range 
of that instinct. 

If inanimate matter endowed with various properties 
is found by combination moving in endless cycles from 
the narrowest limits to the limitless expanse of space 
apparently self-sustained and self-regulated ; if vegetable 
life, endowed with tendencies pointing upwards to 



312 Christian Psychology : 

animal instinct, is seen in countless varieties deriving 
sustenance from inanimate matter in all its forms, and 
regulating its whole being from the first sprouting till it 
droops and dies, having culminated in perfect fructifi- 
cation and development ; if animal life, endowed with 
still higher powers, and sustaining its existence by 
vegetable life or the inferior forms of animated being, 
exhibits a marked self-regulation and control in the 
whole sphere prescribed by the Creator for its early 
growth or mature operation, under the steady guidance 
of a normally unerring instinct, which elicits the admir- 
ation while it transcends the comprehension of the 
superior creature, man ; — what might we not expect the 
normal condition of that creature to be who was raised 
far above mere animal existence by an intellectual 
endowment which enabled him to explore, and in some 
measure to comprehend and admire, the whole creation 
brought within his vision or control, and whose spiritual 
aspirations carried him out to the boundless ages of 
eternity ? Might we not conclude that not only would 
this creature be self-regulated, but that the principle of 
self-regulation would be developed in him in a decidedly 
superior form ? If informed that this being was the 
highest on the globe which was made his abode, that 
all the powers of nature and all the animate existence 
in that world was placed under him and at his service, 
that over the whole face of the planet he stood visibly 
supreme without a rival, our conviction of his self- 
regulation would be strongly confirmed, as it would 
appear unreasonable to place one in authority, with 
extraordinary power at his disposal, and numberless 
sentient beings under his influence, who was unable to 
regulate or control himself. If farther instructed that 



Self-Regulation in the Works of God. 3 1 3 

this honoured creature bore, in respect to his spiritual 
nature, a resemblance to the supreme Creator, endowed, 
in a necessarily restricted measure, with some of the 
attributes of that wondrous Being of whose order this 
universe is so striking a proof, all doubt of his possession 
of that essential quality of self-control and self- regulation 
would vanish, and we would expect to find in him a 
model of propriety in an orderly discharge of every duty 
pertaining to the honored sphere allotted him by his 
Creator. Independence of superior help and control, 
indifference to the pleasure of his Maker, or the assump- 
tion of claims inconsistent with his position as a creature 
or the rights of the supreme Ruler would not be looked 
for by any guided by sound reason. Absolute indepen- 
dence is the attribute of one Being alone, the self- 
existent God. Indifference to the will or pleasure of his 
Maker would at once indicate a radical disorder in man's 
spiritual nature, as interfering with and obstructing the 
grand purpose of his creation. The machinery must 
be deranged when the normal service could not be per- 
formed. And the assumption of unnatural claims would 
be proof of positive antagonism, apostacy, rebellion. 
This is not the place to inquire into man's actual con- 
dition. What it really is can be readily ascertained. 
It is sufficient for our present purpose to show that 
man's position in creation would unmistakably indicate 
a self-regulating power as part of an extensive and varied 
endowment perfectly qualifying him for the discharge 
of every duty imposed upon him by his Maker. 

When we turn our investigations to man what do we 
find? When we ask him the question: — Hast thou been 
endowed with a self-regulating power by which thy 
whole moral conduct might be exercised aright ? what 



314 Christian Psychology : 

answer may we receive ? The answer gathered from 
the voices of thousands scattered over scores of genera- 
tions is : — We have been endowed with such a faculty, 
for a law has been written on our hearts to regulate our 
conduct by directing us in what is right and restraining 
us from what is wrong. This language is true, for it is 
the utterance of universal humanity. Intelligence and 
emotion are associated in creation with morality. There 
must be a law to regulate the exercise of the one and 
the other. Intellect must be directed to the study and 
the use of creation with the highest end in view ; and 
emotion must be exercised on objects and in measure 
commensurate with the rank and purposes of being. 
We have no reason to believe that any intellectual 
being exists devoid of moral powers, that is, devoid 
of the moral faculty that takes cognizance of a supreme 
moral law, and seeks to subject the whole nature to that 
law. Created intelligence is subject to law. Morality 
is the domain of law. Therefore the agent and the 
expression of the supreme law must occupy the throne 
of the rational creature, the intellectual and emotional 
nature with their exponent, the will, being subject. 

It will be seen, therefore, that we have reached a 
most important and most interesting department of 
psychology. We have to examine into the nature of 
this faculty which claims to give law to man, to dis- 
tinguish its operations, to point out its authority, to 
explain its present irregular and defective movements, 
and to notice the means by which its original perfection 
of character and influence may be completely restored. 
In this, man will appear as the subject of a moral 
Governor of highest rectitude, but his conduct will 
disclose him a sinner woefully disorganised, shattered, 



Self-Regulation in the Works of God. 315 

and corrupted ; while he will be found in that peculiar 
position in which a choice for eternity must be made 
between distress that baffles all description, from the 
violent accusations of this very faculty, and complete 
restoration to pristine integrity by the acceptance of 
the proffered help of his gracious Creator. 



3 16 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE NATURE OF THE NORMAL FACULTY- 
REVIEW OF CLASSIFIED OPINIONS. 

The thoughtful in every generation have recognised in 
the mental or spiritual constitution of man, the existence 
of a principle, power, or faculty declaring certain designs, 
actions, or utterances, to be wrong or right, to be 
improper or proper, to be condemnable or commendable. 
But in respect to the nature of this principle or faculty 
they have not been agreed. Some have regarded it as 
a distinctly divine element in the human soul. This has 
been the language of some of the ancients ; and expres- 
sions of modern thought describing it as " the voice of 
God in the human soul " might seem to endorse this 
ancient opinion. Others speak of it as the reason in its 
highest form, the intellect occupied in discerning the 
agreement or disagreement between moral acts and 
some acknowledged standard. Others view it as a 
feeling or sense, a display of the emotional nature under 
quickened apprehensions. A fourth class conceive this 
peculiar mental action to be an introversion of thought, 
the soul comparing its conduct with some law or 
standard of propriety ; and its declaration or voice to be 
a result of the judgment, and not the expression of any 
distinct faculty. And lastly by some modern writers it 
is taken to be a mere sentiment, the growth of some 
religious habit or the expression of some established 
public opinion. 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 3 1 7 

From this variety of opinion it may be seen that the 
correct apprehension of the nature of this deciding 
power or would-be authority, is attended with some 
difficulty. It may also be inferred that there is some- 
thing in the manifestations of this faculty to give rise to 
each shade of opinion enumerated. Thus it seems to 
point to some law known or unknown, and to speak 
with such authority, and even vehemence, that it is not 
surprising that it should be spoken of as the " voice of 
God " or the " mind of God " within a man. Then its 
claim to connection with the judgment may be readily 
apprehended, and its designation as "the right reason," 
may be justified. None may doubt that it wields the 
emotional nature with peculiar force, and hence its sup- 
posed origin in this department of our being. As the 
feeling of approbation or disapprobation is generally 
preceded by a deduction from an examination of some 
conduct or action, there is an apparent ground for the 
opinion that conscience or this moral faculty is a blend- 
ing of two powers of our nature, the intellectual and the 
emotional. The introversion, examination, and com- 
parison exhibited in the movements of this power, 
together with the etymology of the word " conscience," 
have induced the idea that the normal faculty is simply 
the mind in the exercise of introversion of thought, 
with reference to some supposed law. And that it 
should be regarded as " a growth," need not excite 
wonder, for conscience can be developed. It may be 
stunted and dwarfed by ignorance and repression ; or it 
may expand and raise its head above all other powers, 
and be the overshadowing influence of the whole man. 
Yet we are far from supposing that it has no deeper 
root than local religious or public opinion. 



3 1 8 Christian Psychology : 

Though we may not adopt any one of these opinions, 
yet we are prepared to admit that the manifestations 
and developments of this faculty warrant the belief that 
there is a real or seeming element of truth in each of 
them ; and therefore before we proceed to state what we 
conceive to be the precise nature of the normal faculty, 
we will afford a short space for their brief examination. 



SECTION I. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY A DIVINE ELEMENT. 
CICERO — SENECA EPICTETUS ANTONINUS. 

First — That the normal faculty was " the mind of 
God," and " a part " or " fragment " of the divine 
essence. 

This opinion was held by some of the most eminent 
ancient philosophers. Cicero (born 106 B.C.) writes : 
"Hanc video sapientissimorum fuisse sententiam ; legem 
esse ceternum quiddam, quod universum mundum regeret. 
Ita principem legem Mam et ultimam mentem dicebant, 
omnia ratione aut cogentis aut vetantis Dei." — De Le- 
gibus, Lib. 2. " I see that this was the opinion of 
the wisest : law is an external something which should 
rule the whole world. So they say that that chief law 
is the highest mind of God, impelling or forbidding all 
things by reason." And again, explicitly : — " Lex vera 
atque princeps apta ad jubendum et ad vetandum ratio 
est recta summi jfovis." " The true and also chief law 
fitted to order and forbid is the right reason of the 
highest God." 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 3.1 9 

Seneca (born about the beginning of our era) writes, 
in Epistle 66 :• " Una inducitur humanis virtutibus 
regula ; ratio recta simplex que; nihil est divino divinius, 
ccelesti ccelestius. Ratio autem nihil aliud est quatn in 
corpus humanum pars divini spiritus rnersa." " One rule 
is imposed on human virtues, right and simple reason, 
than the divine there is nothing more divine ; than the 
heavenly, nothing more heavenly. But reason is nothing 
else than a part of the divine spirit incased in a human 
body." Again he says : " Sacer intra nos spiritus sedet, 
malorum bonorumque nostrorum observator et custos." 
" A sacred spirit dwells within us, the observer and the 
recorder both of our bad and good actions." It is clear 
that by " reason " he means the " recta ratio" or " right 
reason," the faculty which imposes a moral law on con- 
duct, as it professes to regulate human virtues. 

Epictetus, a moral philosopher of some note (born 
about a.d. 50), speaking of the logos, or reason, as regu- 
lating conduct, says : — " Kurun tov Xoyov ou§e ^sigoov 
toov beoov ovds txixgoTego$." — " As to reason, it is nothing 
less nor inferior to that of the gods." His meaning is 
that the human reason which regulates morals partakes 
of the same nature and is not inferior in its require- 
ments to that of the gods. 

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, one of the noblest of the 
Roman emperors, and a Stoic philosopher (born a.d. 
121), in the 5th book of his own life, speaking of the soul 
of man in relation to the supreme Being says, chap. 6 : 
" A7ro<T7ra(rfj,a scivtov ovto$ Se scttiv sxu(TT0V vov$ kou Xoyo§." 
— " The mind and reason of each is but a fragment of 
himself," that is of God. 

Two things are plainly taught in these extracts that the 
ancients spoke of reason, "ratio" and " Koyoc " as exer- 



3?o Christian Psychology : 

cising a regulating power over the conduct, as a moral 
influence in the soul, and that the highest known, and 
therefore what we call the normal faculty — and that 
this principle, power, or faculty, was the " mind of 
God," u a part of the divine Spirit," " something equal 
in nature and duty to the same faculty in God," or " a 
fragment or shred of divinity itself." They were right 
in regarding the moral principle the ogQo; Xoyo$ or recta 
ratio as the highest in man, and as representing the 
mind of God when under proper influence ; but they 
erred in speaking of it or of the human soul as a part 
of the divine Spirit as equal to God, or as a fragment 
or emanation of Deity. The Creator must never be 
confounded with his creation, or the Governor with his 
subjects. 



SECTION II. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY— THE INTELLECT IN EXERCISE 
ON MORAL SUBJECTS. 

CUDWORTH CLARKE PRICE KANT. 

Second, — That moral distinctions and judgments are 
the offspring of the intellect or reason only, and not of 
any distinct moral faculty. The advocates of this 
opinion include some very distinguished men. We can 
only notice a mere selection. 

Ralph Cudworth (born a. d. 1617), one of the most dis- 
tinguished, in a great literary age, for learning and 
intellectual vigour, held that the reason of man appre- 
hended moral truths as it apprehended mathematical 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 321 

truths, that the one came under its cognisance as the 
other, and were pronounced right or wrong, true or 
false, according to the nature of the subject presented 
for adjudication. He says, in his great work : — " The 
measure and rule of truth can be no foreign or extra- 
neous thing without the mind, but must be native and 
domestic to it, or contained within the mind itself, and 
therefore can be nothing but its clear and distinct per- 
ception." In the immediate context he had in view 
fundamental truths of science, but as he advances he 
shows that he includes all truths, and speaks of " eternal 
moral truths" as apprehended by the intellect. 

Samuel Clarke (born a. d. 1675), another eminent writer, 
attributes to the intellect the apprehension of moral 
truths, with the same propriety as problems in geometry. 
He lays the foundation of morality in the "fitness of 
things," and says that it belongs to the intellect to dis- 
cover the fitness or unfitness of each particular deed to 
some required standard, and to pronounce accordingly. 
With him there must be some eternal standard of recti- 
tude, by which all the conduct of men shall be measured 
and either condemned or approved. He holds with 
Cudworth that the standard of morality is not even the 
will of the Almighty, but the nature of the supreme 
Being, of which his will is the exponent. As the intellect 
perceives that the three-angles of any triangle are equal 
to the two right angles, or that two parallel straight lines 
extended can never meet, so it perceives the agreements 
or disagreements of all human conduct with the standard 
of morality which we may adopt. 

Richard Price (born a.d. 1723), a writer of some note 
in his day, in his " Review of the Principal Questions 
and Difficulties in Morals," states very distinctly what 



322 Christian Psychology : 

he apprehends to be the faculty of the human soul which 
has to do with morals. He approved of Dr. Clarke's 
theory of the fitness of things, and endorsed his judg- 
ment of the normal faculty. He asks the question, 
What is the power within us that perceives the distinc- 
tion between right and wrong ? and answers, The 
Understanding. 

Immanuel Kant (born a.d. 1724), one of the most 
acute and penetrating intellects of modern times, attri- 
butes to reason the distinction of right and wrong. 
Reason, he says, is exercised about three questions : — 
" What can I know ? What ought I to do ? and what 
may I hope?" To the first belongs science; to the 
second, morals ; to the third, faith. Reason is exercised 
in all ; but when occupied with the second question he 
would designate it, Practical reason. Practical reason, 
with him, points out the path of duty, obedience to moral 
laws ; these laws are the result of experience ; the end 
of all is the happiness of the creature ; this is the summum 
bonum, the highest good, and what it is, is discovered by 
experience, and embodied in moral laws which have been 
discovered by reason, and are constantly apprehended by 
reason in order to practice. 

On these opinions we offer the following remarks. 
We may agree with Cudworth in the conclusion that the 
" measure and rule " of things visible and tangible must 
be within us, for if our senses, in proper exercise, deceive 
us on what can we rely in respect to the external world ; 
and if our intellectual faculties cannot apprehend the 
magnitude and relationship of things presented for their 
cognisance we have no other power on which to fall 
back. But we think that, as moral beings, it would be 
reasonable to suppose that we should have a moral 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 323 

faculty. We are formed to do, to act, to obey as subjects 
as well as to know : we have abilities to know in order 
to do ; but to do or act aright, that is to obey, we must 
have a rule — that rule must be either within or without 
us : if within us, we have been perfectly created for all 
the purposes of our being; if not within us, but wholly 
without us, there must be an external revelation of the 
will of our Maker, in some form, in nature without us, in 
providence or in grace, and abilities fitted to apprehend 
this external law most clearly and perfectly. It will be 
admitted that that being is more worthy of being called 
perfect who carries a law within him wherever he goes, 
to act as a regulator with promptness and vigour at all 
times, than one who had to search for a law without him 
amid the varied objects and experiences by which he is 
surrounded. We are warranted by analogy in searching 
for such a law, and if we find it we should hail the dis- 
covery as of a lost power in the spiritual world which 
accounts for the numerous perturbations which for ages 
have been the subjects of observation. It is easy to 
prove that the apprehensions of what we call the normal 
faculty are something very different from mere intellectual 
apprehensions. A man looks through the plan of a ship 
or a problem in geometry, and after a little investigation 
apprehends clearly the connection of the various parts, 
and the principles on which the construction is carried 
on. This is a simple intellectual apprehension. But 
the same man, on looking over his account-books, may 
discover an entry falsely made, in quantity or quality, or 
both. The apprehension in this case is very different : 
it is instantly attended with self-accusations, and all the 
excuses that may be gathered up to silence this feeling 
are for the time generally unavailing — a voice within 



324 Christian Psychology : 

reiterates the charge of wrong and injustice done to a 
fellow-creature. It would be most unphilosophical to 
assert that the same faculties alone were occupied in 
both these cases. Cudworth, from time to time, speaks 
of conscience, but generally in connection w T ith religion, 
and seems to attach to it the idea of religious conviction 
or principle — something that man has assumed or adopted 
for the regulation of his conduct. 

We agree with Clarke that there is an eternal standard 
of rectitude — that some things are wrong and others 
right, not because man has declared them to be such, or 
proved them to be such in experience, but because God has 
declared them to be such both by nature, providence and 
revelation; and this declaration is not an arbitrary expres- 
sion of his will in respect to some temporary arrangement 
forbidden or tolerated, which arrangement, whatever its 
nature, could rot be wrong so far as he was concerned, but 
is the expression of his nature — the exponent of what he 
approves and of what he disapproves, of what he loves, 
and of what he hates. Beyond this we cannot go. We 
cannot ascend beyond the divine nature ; we cannot 
overlook the infinite. There is reason in all his laws. 
We may not say that he binds himself by the laws 
framed for his creatures ; but we may say that if they 
are an exponent of his own nature, he will not act in 
opposition to them. He who has forbidden a lie will 
not himself lie ; he who forbids injustice will not act 
unjustly. How much beyond the laws which regulate 
our moral being he may go, we know not. There are 
moral creatures far above us to whom some of our laws 
cannot apply, for example, the fifth and seventh com- 
mandments. But there are laws of truth and justice 
and love which, we apprehend, hold sway in the whole 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 325 

intelligent universe, which are binding upon all moral 
creatures, and which are founded on the nature of the 
self-existent and incomprehensible Jehovah. These 
essential laws of truth, justice, and benevolence are 
eternal as their origin, and therefore immutable. 
Morality with Clarke is a fitness to this standard of 
right. This we may accept. But the question is, what 
is the faculty that is occupied with declaring the fitness 
or unfitness of thoughts, words, and deeds with an 
assumed standard ? Clarke says the fitness or unfitness 
is apprehended by the intellect as if it were a problem 
in geometry. Now, we will not deny that the intellect 
is exercised in comparing the conduct with an acknow- 
ledged rule of rectitude, but we cannot conceal from 
ourselves that over and above the perceived conformity 
or unconformity there is the pointed decision of a judge, 
the accusation and the threatening of an officer of jus- 
tice, or if the deed is not committed, the earnest 
warning and the stern forbidding. Is this all mere 
intellectual apprehension, as of conformity or uncon- 
formity in lines and figures of a geometrical problem ? — 
We may boldly say psychology disowns the conclusion. 

What disposes of Clarke's opinion bears with equal 
force on the explicit declarations of Price, who adopts 
his theory. 

Kant differs widely in many things from the above 
three, but agrees with them in this that he acknowledges 
nothing superior to reason in the spiritual constitution 
of man. He magnifies reason. But his explorations 
by its aid have proved how limited is the intellectual 
power of man, met on all sides by an impassable gulf; 
stopped in upward flight by the failure of the wings to 
carry him further ; unable to sound the depths over 



326 Christian Psychology : 

which he is sailing, by the utter inadequacy of the length 
of his line. Not only is the range of action all round 
limited, but within the limits over which it delights to 
roam and to explore, it is met by apparent contradic- 
tions, seeming antinomies, which it cannot reconcile, 
and over which it must breathe the confession — " These 
things are too deep for me ; I cannot comprehend them." 
This is what might be expected from the low rank- of 
man in the spiritual scale of beings, and from his present 
immature intellectual condition. He knows, and can 
know but in part. With Kant, science, duty, and religion 
are alike apprehended by reason. So far we may go 
with him. Reason is exercised in each, but not reason 
only. Science forms an appropriate field for reason or 
the intellectual powers, but even these are to be exer- 
cised under law. We must do all things to the glory of 
God. But duty requires something more than mere 
reason — a restraining and impelling power. And what 
is religion without faith ? And is faith a form of reason ? 
There is reason in all faith that God demands of us, 
but it is a reason in some cases which bids faith go 
forward, rest, and adore, where it can only stand and wait 
but cannot comprehend. Reason is a noble endowment 
of the human soul ; it is the light of the soul, and rightly 
used, it will disclose a world of wonders, but we must 
not exalt it above measure. It is not the only endow- 
ment. Man has a fount of feeling of wondrous variety 
and power. And he has, as we affirm, a moral faculty 
accusing, condemning, theatening, when actions are 
done or resolved upon which are contrary to some 
acknowledged standard of rectitude. Is this singular 
perturbation of soul the result of reason only ? Is it the 
offspring of intellect merely ? It may be said that 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 327 

intellect has previously apprehended a law, and that it 
has now discovered a want of conformity to that law, 
and that the perception of the disagreement has 
produced this perturbation or distress. It is clear, 
then, that the distress felt is something different 
from the intellectual apprehension, and is appa- 
rently a result, or at lea~'„ a consequence of the 
intellectual apprehension. But when the distress 
assumes, as it often does, a specific form, and 
speaks out boldly as an accuser, and dictates as a 
master, and condemns as a judge, we are compelled to 
investigate this psychological fact, and ask is this a 
mere result of intellect ? does intellect so accuse, con- 
demn, and warn ? That intellect is in exercise, that it has 
been and is employed we readily admit ; but we regard it 
rather as the instrument of a higher power, as the officer of 
a court of justice rather than the judge on the bench. The 
intellect or reason is the mental eye by which the judge 
sees and discerns the case as brought under judicial 
notice, but the perception of the case is something 
distinct from the accusation of guilt and the sentence of 
condemnation. We may not confound the counsel with 
the judge. Hence we regard Kant's revelation of the 
mysteries of mind as decidedly defective. There is 
something higher than reason in the mental phenomena 
which pass under the common term " conscience." But 
may these phenomena not find their true place in the 
emotional nature of man ? We shall see. 



328 Christian Psychology : 



SECTION III. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY REGARDED AS AN EMOTIONAL 
OPERATION. 

HUME SMITH M'INTOSH BROWN. 

Third, — That the normal faculty, or conscience, is 
simply the emotional nature of man variously exercised. 

David Hume (born a.d. 171 1) writes: — "The final 
sentence which pronounces characters and actors 
amiable or odious, probably depends on some internal 
sense or feeling which nature has made universal in the 
whole species.' 5 

Adam Smith (born a.d. 1723) writes: — "It is alto- 
gether absurd and unintelligible to suppose that the first 
perceptions of right and wrong can be derived from 
reason. These first perceptions cannot be the object of 
reason, but of immediate sense and feeling.'''' 

Sir James M'Intosh (born a.d. 1765), in his Disserta- 
tion on Ethical Philosophy, when reviewing Butler, 
writes : — " The truth seems to be that the moral senti- 
ments, in their mature state are a class of feelings which 
have no other object but the mental dispositions leading 
to voluntary actions, and the voluntary actions which 
flow from these dispositions." 

And Dr. Thomas Brown (born a.d. 1778), in his 81st 
Lecture, writes : — " Moral obligation, virtue, vice, right, 
wrong, merit, demerit, and whatever other words may 
be synonymous with these, all denote their relations to 
one simple feeling of the mind — the distinctive sentiment 
of moral approbation or disapprobation which arises on 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 329 

the contemplation of certain actions." Brown opposes 
the ideas of Hutcheson, in respect to a moral sense, 
and declares that " There is nothing analogous to sense 
or perception in the sentiment ;" and adds that what 
Hutcheson " calls an idea is nothing more than an 
emotion, considered in relation to the act which excites 
it." 

It will be seen how widely these four powerful 
thinkers differ from the preceding four. Hume says the 
sentence announcing an act moral or immoral springs 
from a feeling that is universal. Smith declares it 
absurd to suppose that a perception of right or wrong 
would have its origin in reason, and regards it as the 
immediate offspring of feeling. M'Intosh is of opinion 
that moral sentiments when matured are a class of 
feelings producing mental dispositions which lead to 
actions — an awkward way of stating that moral senti- 
ment is feeling in one of its varieties. And Brown 
affirms the moral sentiment to be a feeling of approba- 
tion or disapprobation on the contemplation of certain 
actions. He is clear in his conviction that it is not an 
idea, but an emotion arising from the view of an act. 

The preceding four were equally satisfied that it per- 
tained to the intellect, or reason, to distinguish right 
from wrong, and that the moral sentiment was a declar- 
ation of the judgment in respect to the fitness or unfit- 
ness, agreement or disagreement, of any particular 
thought, design, or act, to some required standard of 
morality. 

We are dealing now with those who trace the moral 

sentiment to mere feeling or emotion — in other words, 

that man's emotional nature gives rise to the sentiment 

of right and wrong, just as it produces fear or joy on 

x 



330 Christian Psychology : 

appropriate objects becoming the subjects of contem- 
plation. It is impossible to reflect with any measure of 
ability on this intricate subject without perceiving that 
these writers have grasped at least a portion of the truth 
regarding the moral sentiment. But have they grasped 
the full truth ? Can it be that emotions such as joy and 
fear, the two chiefly excited in this department, can 
account for the peculiar and powerful manifestations of 
what we call the normal faculty ? We think not. There 
is not only the pleasing feeling diffused over the soul 
when something humane, noble, or generous has been 
done ; but there are the prompt, poignant, startling 
accusations, the reiterated charges, the repeated author- 
itative judgments, the refusal to let the soul off, the 
enforcement of its presence at a tribunal where it is 
constrained to hear its sentence, and after it has been 
pronounced it is hung up before it, as if to prevent its 
being lost sight of. It can make itself heard and felt 
before a deed has been performed as well as after. There 
is often a debate carried on in the soul in respect to the 
propriety of a certain act. At times the emotions of joy 
and fear, instead of giving rise to this moral sentiment, 
may be in direct antagonism to it. The pleasure con- 
ceived to be associated with a certain deed may prompt 
to it, but the voice of conscience remonstrates and forbids 
on the ground of the impropriety and the injustice of 
such a proceeding. Fear may impel a man to leave a 
post of danger where he is the mark of the enemy, but a 
sense of right, of truth, of honour, this regulating faculty 
called conscience forbids it, and says, — You shall not 
retreat — rather die defending what you have solemnly 
vowed to maintain even at the sacrifice of life. We 
cannot overlook the tone of authority with which these 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 331 

sentiments, these moral judgments, are delivered. We 
know that intellectual apprehensions may enrapture or 
enchain the whole soul, that emotions may become all- 
absorbing, but in no mental or spiritual movement in the 
human soul is the voice of command, or the tone of 
authority, so distinct and emphatic as in this moral 
operation. When evil or wrongdoing is proposed, sug- 
gested, or contemplated, it may stride across the path 
and boldly say, — You shall not do it ! and on being 
disregarded, it may speak still louder, till the man is 
actually arrested in his course, and turns back. And 
when a foul deed has been accomplished, the demand 
of a master not of a servant is heard, the cry is, " Come 
hither, and see what thou hast done ! " A refusal is met 
by force, the man is constrained to see in the light 
of the law what he has done, and as a criminal to hear his 
sentence. His feelings in both cases, in the preventing 
and punishing, are made to hold a subordinate place ; law 
is paramount ; the right and the wrong are kept before 
his eyes, irrespective of his feelings. We may not 
give the consequent the place of the antecedent. If 
the antecedent assumes the superior place, and acts 
without an invariable consequent, it demands the chief 
recognition. It is a master attended with an ordinary 
servant, but also one who shows his ability to act with 
or without his ordinary attendant. We may not give 
to an attendant the place of the leader. We do not 
lose sight of the fact that the emotion of approbation or 
disapprobation, said to be the moral sentiment, is 
admitted by these writers to be the consequence of the 
contemplation of certain acts, and is to be regarded 
in connection with these acts ; but we affirm that mere 
feeling cannot account for the varied manifestations of 



332 Christian Psychology : 

authority and power exercised in respect to what is 
considered duty; and that there is an attribute in the 
human soul that assumes the right to command and to 
judge, and that emotion ordinarily waits upon this 
faculty, as it waits upon certain intellectual apprehen- 
sions ; and further, that it may and does speak when no 
perceptible emotion follows to disturb the soul. 



SECTION IV. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY— AN INTROVERTION OF THOUGHT 
AND COMPARISON WITH A MORAL STANDARD. 

PURITAN DIVINES — SIBBES WARD — GOODWIN — CHARNOCK 

CLARKSON. 

Fourth, — That the phenomena of conscience are ex- 
plainable by the mind in the exercise of introvertion 
of thought, comparing its own conduct with a moral 
standard. 

This is substantially the view held by many of the reli- 
gious thinkers of the Puritan period. Among the Puritan 
preachers were men of profound thought. They were 
deeply read in scholastic learning, and they were pro- 
foundly acquainted with Scriptural ethics. In their 
writings they have left us the results of their explora- 
tions of the region of morality, both with the dim lights 
of Platonic philosophy and scholastic weapons, and the 
purer light and safer guides of inspired authorities. We 
do not say that they have been wholly successful, but 
they have at least helped to clear the way for 
future explorers — have accomplished what should merit 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 333 

the gratitude of those who succeeded them — have anti- 
cipated some of the most important conclusions of 
moralists such as Butler, and lighted the path to fame 
of some who have not acknowledged their obligations. 
That they have not fully unravelled the intricacies of 
the normal faculty will not excite surprise, when we 
reflect on the diversities of opinion among the most 
distinguished philosophers of the subsequent genera- 
tions on this subject. On the manifestations, opera- 
tions, authority, influence and importance of conscience, 
they are full and detailed. It is in the psychological 
department — in the nature of the faculty — that we con- 
ceive that their chief defect will be found. We will select 
the definitions given by a few of these learned men, that 
the reader may judge of the accuracy of our obser- 
vations. 

Dr. Richard Sibbes (a.d. 1577-1635) writes, in his 
commentary on 2 Cor. 1 chap.: — "What is conscience 
but the soul itself reflecting upon itself? It is the pro- 
perty of the reasonable soul, and the excellency of it, 
that it can return upon itself. .... Conscience 
is called the spirit, the heart, the soul, because it is 
nothing but the soul reflecting and returning upon itself. 
It is called conscience — that is, one knowing joined 
with another — because conscience knows itself, and it 
knows what it knows. It is also called conscience 
because it knows with God. Therefore, it judgeth of 
its own acts because it can return upon itself." 

Rev. Samuel Ward, B.D. (a.d. 1577- 1639), writes, in 
his " Balm from Gilead," as to the nature of conscience : 
— " Some fools doubt whether there be in them such a 
thing, yea or no. Origen thought it a spirit or genius, 
associated to our souls, to guide and tutor them ; but 



334 Christian Psychology : 

this is like some of his other conceits. The schoolmen, 
somewhat acuter, thought it some an habit, some an 
act of the soul — the later divines, a faculty of the intel- 
lectual part. But the truth is, it is no such inmate, no 
such guest of the soul ; but an inbred faculty of it — a 
noble and divine power, planted of God in the soul, 
working upon itself by reflection ; or thus, the soul 
of a man recoiling upon itself." In a note on the 
etymology of the word, he quotes the language of 
Bernard: — u Cum alia scit animus, scientia dicitur y cum 
seipsum, conscientia" — " when the soul knows other 
things, it is called knowledge ; when it knows itself, it 
is called conscience." Farther on he reaches some 
conclusions to which we had come before falling in with 
his views, in which he says : — " Let us turn our sight to 
behold and wonder at the divine royalties and endow- 
ments of it, it being in man the principal part of God's 
image, and that by which man resembleth most the 
autarchy and self-sufficiency of God. This faculty 
makes him self-sufficient and independent of other 
creatures, like unto those self-moving engines which 
have their principle of motion within themselves." In 
the conclusion of the treatise from which these extracts 
are taken, there is one of the most powerful appeals to 
conscience which our language contains. It may not 
be improper to state that these views were given to the 
world before Cudworth was born, and sixty years before 
his great work, " The Intellectual System of the 
Universe," was published. 

Thomas Goodwin, D.D. (a.d. 1600-1679), in his work 
on the Holy Ghost, enters at great length on the nature, 
condition, and operations of conscience. He writes : 
" Conscience is that only principle in a man under 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 335 

whose cognisance comes all that hath the notion of 
what is morally good or evil, and which with one and 
the same eye, vieweth a rule or law forbidding evil, or 
commanding good ; and together therewith do we take 
a glance of God, as the supreme judge giving that law, 
and backing it with threatening or promises of rewards. 
And thus the etymology of the name denotes, conscientia, 
quasi cum alio sciens, Viz., with God, and from this 
knowledge of God, which it carries about with it, 
together with its being a rule or law, it is that that 
obligation, power, or force of it doth arise which binds 
a man, though no creature doth look on, to be a witness 
of his sin, and so he becomes " a law unto himself." 

Key. Stephen Charnock, B.D. (a.d. 1628-1680), in his 
treatise on " Practical Atheism," writes : " Conscience 
is nothing but an actuated or reflex knowledge of a 
superior, and an equitable law ; a law impressed, and a 
power ab^ve it impressing it. Conscience is not the law 
giver, but the remembrancer to mind us of that law of 
nature imprinted upon our souls, and actuate the con- 
siderations of the duty and penalty, to apply the rule to 
our acts, and to pass judgment upon the matter of fact." 

Similar sentiments might be given from others. One 
very learned author — Rev. David Clarkson, B.D. (a.d. 
1621-1686) — speaks of it as the "freest faculty, and the 
most exempt from the control of any other authority," 
yet subject to God as his deputy or vicegerent. The 
vigorous and powerful intellect of this writer has more 
than once grasped the leading faculties of the human 
soul in a manner that places him as a mental analyst 
above many who have in subsequent times made it 
their study to investigate these subjects. His references 
to the mental phenomena occur when treating of other 



336 Christian Psychology: 

subjects, and give us a glimpse of what we might have 
had if psychology had become a special subject of inves- 
tigation. A Puritan preacher might then have held the 
place now filled by the distinguished Locke. 

From the extracts given from the Puritans we cannot 
endorse the statement of Dr. McCosh, in his introduction 
to Charnock's works, when speaking of the Puritans. 
He says : — " They attempt no psychological analysis of 
this power [conscience]. They do not inquire whether 
it is an exercise of the reason on the one hand, or a sense, 
sentiment, or feeling, on the other. This was a question 
started in the next age by Samuel Clarke on the one 
side, and Shaftesbury and Francis Hutcheson on Jjie 
other." It will be seen that some of them devoted very 
particular pains to explore its operations, and have 
attempted to define and explain its nature. Ward 
expressly rejects the idea of its intellectual origin sub- 
sequently maintained by Clarke. In their definitions 
they were altogether too much hampered by the ety- 
mology of the word " conscience," both in its Greek and 
Latin origin. The idea of conjunct knowledge, that is, 
a conjunct view of moral conduct and the law which 
should regulate it, is wholly inadequate to represent the 
normal faculty. These deep thinkers felt this ; and in 
their illustrations of the power and operations of the 
faculty, they went far beyond their own definitions of 
the name. Had their various ideas been collected and 
systematised, and a definition of the nature of the power 
been framed from its proved offices and operations, we 
would have an induction from facts to which little 
addition might be made. While an introvertion of 
thought, a comparison of conduct with a law, is within 
the range of the intellectual faculties — and so far con- 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 337 

science is, if limited to its etymological meaning — these 
writers as a rule speak of it as quite distinct from the 
intellect ; as " a law," " a principle," " a faculty," occu- 
pying the highest place of authority in the soul. A 
recent author in this city, adhering to the etymology of 
the term, has defined conscience as : "The moral pro- 
duct of introversion of thought, it is not a faculty, as is 
commonly thought, but a result." And again more 
fully : " Conscience, then is an actual judgment passed 
by us on our own moral state, combined with the painful 
or pleasing feeling which thence results " (Quaiffe Intell. 
Scien., vol. I., pp. 63, 66). This definition we cannot 
accept. Conscience is much more than a judgment with 
its accompanying feeling of pleasure or pain. It does 
pass sentences which are attended with feeling, but it 
does much more. The intellect is competent for deduc- 
tion, with its accompanying emotions, but it is not 
competent for the offices of accuser, witness, judge, 
ruler, executioner, all which come within the domain 
of this faculty. The Puritans, from their profound 
researches into man's moral nature, could not be tied 
down to their defective definition. They failed in not 
establishing a harmony between their discoveries and 
their definition. This in part is to be accounted for by 
the subject being generally handled as a collateral dis- 
cussion in illustration of some superior purpose. 



338 Christian Psychology : 



SECTION V. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY— A GROWTH, A HABIT, THE 
RESULT OF EDUCATION AND PUBLIC OPINION. 

PALEY CHAMBERS' ENCYCLOPEDIA. 

Fifth. — That conscience is a growth, a habit of more 
or less strength, formed by education or public opinion. 

Paley expresses this opinion when he says ; " Upon 
the whole, it seems to me either that there exists no such 
instincts as compose what is called the moral sense, or 
that they are not now to be distinguished from prejudices 
or habits." This theory assumes various forms. The 
moral code is supposed to spring from utility, from what 
has been by experience proved to be of use to society ; 
and with this are associated certain national and re- 
ligious predilections or prejudices, having from custom 
the force of law. The conscience is a habit, the result of 
the training and development of two principles — self- 
preservation, or a regard for ourselves, and sympathy, or 
a regard for others. " The child is first taught obedience 
by penalties, and is made to associate pain with forbidden 
actions. This is the germ of conscience. Habits of avoid- 
ing what is prohibited under penalties are gradually 
formed, and the sense of authority and law is thereby 
acquired." Afterwards, as knowledge advances, what was 
the product of fear becomes the result of spontaneous ap- 
probation. Conscience thus follows, and does not precede 
the experience of human authority. (Chamb. Encyc, 
Art. Ethics.) 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 339 

It is sufficient to say, in answer to Paley, that we find 
this normal power often in direct collision with habits. 
The man is pursuing a course altogether opposed to this 
moral monitor within, and the result of the contest some- 
times is that the habits are successfully resisted and 
overcome. Prejudices are powerful mental habits, and 
they may be found giving a bias to conscience, both in 
the right and in the wrong, according to the training 
received ; but conscience may be heard speaking over 
and above these prejudices on the exhibition of truth to 
the mind, and in a moment the prejudices of years may 
be cast to the winds, and the supremacy of conscience 
be openly displayed. It is not philosophical to confound 
things that are frequently antagonistic, and the result of 
education with a power that often reverses the life in 
opposition to that education. We appeal to ordinary 
experience. It may be said that the change is simply 
attributable to fresh light in the understanding. We 
admit the fresh light : by it the eyes of conscience have 
been opened ; but a power may be felt pressing this fresh 
light on the attention of the soul, and refusing to let it 
pass from before the observation of the mind till the con- 
duct has been conformed to it. Is there no clear dis- 
tinction between the information lodged in the mind and 
the power that enforces attention to it, and that in oppo- 
sition to strong inclinations to the contrary ? 

In reply to the modern advocates of this theory, as 
explained in the Encyclopaedia, we may state that 
morality has a deeper foundation than utility : there is 
a right and a wrong, from which the useful and the 
useless spring. The one is enjoined and the other for- 
bidden, not only because of natural results immediately 
flowing from them, but because of ulterior consequences 



340 Christian Psychology : 

not now perceptible either by the individual actors or 
by the framers of the law. The law (we speak of the 
highest moral law) springs from the nature of the Being 
who has created us, and from our relationship to him. 
It is not right, then, to say that the law is, because it 
has proved useful; but that it has proved useful because 
it is right. We do not hang its existence upon its 
utility, but upon its fundamental Tightness which we 
believe will result in utility in its widest sense, as 
embracing the glory of God, whatever may be its effect 
on a certain class of creatures. The national and reli- 
gious predilections are embraced in the same principle, 
as they are regarded as belonging to the useful. But 
in respect to conscience as a growth : We cannot help 
regarding the conception as totally inadequate to the 
varied phenomena connected with this moral power. We 
admit a development, as we admit a development of all 
mental and bodily powers under training. But the faculty 
must exist in some form, even as a germ, before it can 
be developed. In the opinion of these writers, fear of 
punishment, as from the threatening of punishment to a 
child for disobedience, is the germ of conscience. This 
germ is afterwards strengthened and confirmed by 
authority and law. The normal faculty is doubtless 
affected by the remembrance of the penalty attached to 
the disregard of authority, but does it never speak when 
no human law has been transgressed ? Does it not often 
make the stoutest heart to tremble where no fear of 
mortal punishment can find place ? Felix trembled when 
the great preacher reasoned of righteousness, temperance 
and judgment to come. It was not that he feared the wrath 
of the Jewish populace, or the displeasure of his master, 
the Roman emperor, or that he was a slave to national 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 341 

prejudices or superstitious notions ; but it was because 
his evil deeds rose before him, and a voice within assured 
him that a judgment was awaiting him for these very- 
deeds. Many are smitten by remorse for deeds which 
they know are beyond the ken of mortal observation or 
discovery. Can such feelings spring from either of the 
fountains of self-preservation or sympathy ? The person 
may be dead on whom the injury was inflicted — the evil 
may never have been revealed to any mortal — yet the 
perpetrator, from no feeling of sympathy or self-preser- 
vation — for the sufferer is gone from human sight, and 
there is no mortal avenger — is distressed from time to 
time by keen accusations of gross misconduct in this 
very deed. And as for human law and authority, this 
power within often resists both, and compels the man to 
take his stand before the powers of earth, admit his 
disregard of their law, and his determination for the 
future to pursue the same course, and that contrary to 
the habits of much of his pas*t life. See Peter the apostle 
before the Jewish Sanhedrim, and Luther before the Diet 
at Worms. Men have quailed under this power who had 
no parental training, and whose high position placed 
them in many respects above all human authority and 
law. This exhibition of the normal power in man is a 
bare presentation of some of its manifestations, and of 
certain influences which help to develop the faculty; but 
it does not touch its origin, and leaves unnoticed its 
greatest doings. 



34 2 Christian Psychology : 



SECTION VI. 

THE NORMAL FACULTY A REGULATING POWER- 
VARIOUSLY ENDOWED. 

CHRYSOSTOM — HIEROCLES BUTLER — M'COSH — WAYLAND 

— AUTHOR'S DEFINITION. 

Sixth, — We shall now notice some views of this faculty, 
believed to be nearer the truth both of nature and of 
revelation. 

Chrysostom (a.d. 347-407), in his 12th Oration, writes: 
"E£ 0Lqyr\c, 7rXuTTcov 0eo£ rov avQgoo7rov vofxov oivtw Qvvixov 

syXUTs()Y}X.S KUl Tl 7T0TS S0~Ti V0[A0$ QVCTIXO; ', TO (TUVSldo^ >JjOUV 

diYigQw<re xoii uvTodiSuxTOV eTroiYj&e t>jv yvootriv toov xuXojv xui 
twv ov toiovtoov." — "At the beginning, when God formed 
man, he placed in him a natural law, — and what, then, 
is that natural law ? Self-knowledge has instructed us, 
and a natural genius has given us the knowledge of 
things that are right and of things that are not such." 

And Hierocles, a moral philosopher of some celebrity 
about the middle of the fifth century, speaks of a 
mental power or faculty as showing us the divine laws — 
O Koyicr^os rovg Qsiovg vopovg V7ro%e%afjisvo$ — " The reason 
or discernment which makes manifest the divine laws." 
And again, the same writer says — Aoyco ogQw nziOto-Qui 
xoii Qsoo tolvtov s(tti — " To obey right reason (conscience) 
is the same as obeying God " — quoted in Goodwin. It is 
more than probable that both these Greek writers united 
with the study of the Platonic philosophy the clearer 
moral philosophy of the Apostolic writings. 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 343 

Coming down to modern times, we have the opinions 
of men who have made the moral nature of man a special 
study. Pre-eminent among these stands Butler, author 
of the " Analogy." His ideas of the nature of this faculty 
are not the most explicit, while his grasp of its operations 
and manifestations is profound and extensive. Without 
limiting himself to any particular term or definition, he 
says : — " It is manifest that a great part of common lan- 
guage and of common behaviour over the world is formed 
on the supposition of such a moral faculty, whether 
called conscience, moral reason, moral sense, or divine 
reason — whether considered as a sentiment of the under- 
standing, or a perception of the heart, or which seems 
the truth as including both," In strict language, we 
speak of perceptions as appertaining to the under- 
standing, and of feeling as belonging to the heart. 
Butler's definition is rather an explanation of the opera- 
tion of the faculty, employing, as it does, both the intel- 
lectual and emotional nature of man to show its presence 
and power. Preceding writers teem with ideas as far 
advanced as these. 

M'Cosh, in his " Method of the Moral Government of 
God," speaks of conscience as presenting three aspects. 
First, as proceeding upon and revealing a law; second, 
as pronouncing an authoritative judgment upon actions; 
and third, as possessing a class of emotions, or as a sen- 
timent. After explaining each of these aspects he adds : 
— " The view now offered of conscience, from the way in 
which we have been obliged to state it, may seem a very 
complex one ; in reality, it is very simple. The conscience 
is the mind looking to a moral law, and pronouncing 
judgments giving rise to emotions. We do not see how 
anything could be simpler" (p. 306). The sentence is 



344 Christian Psychology : 

simple enough ; but the definition is one which Ralph 
Cudworth, Samuel Clarke, or Richard Price could adopt. 
We might ask where is the moral law to which the mind 
looks ? If it is only in the Scriptures, will we limit 
the faculty of conscience to those only who have the 
Scriptures ? Is the conscience the mind looking to a 
law, and not a law written in the heart, requiring the 
obedience of the man ? If the conscience is the moral 
nature of man, beating responsive to an invisible moral 
law pervading the universe of intelligence, is it not 
substantially a law within, rather than the mind looking 
to a law ? The emotional nature does not always wait for 
judgments, but is often agitated by accusations and 
threatenings anterior to a formal comparison of actions 
with a moral law. On the three " aspects" we may 
remark that we accept the first as correct, but not exactly 
in his sense. The normal .faculty does reveal a law, 
though obscurely, and proceeds upon it; but it is some- 
thing more than an " eye," to which M'Cosh compares 
it. He says : — " Conscience is not the law itself — it is 
merely the organ which makes it known to us — the eye 
that looks to it." If we were to accept this, we could 
not stop short of Cudworth's theory: the moral nature 
would be resolved into the intellectual. But in truth the 
normal faculty reveals a law and proceeds upon it as 
responsive to the moral nature of God, though very 
imperfectly. The needle of the compass reveals a 
magnetic current, invisible to mortal eye, and proceeds 
upon it by following the variations of that current. The 
second "aspect" we approve without comment. The 
language of the third is not satisfactory. We do not 
think that conscience " possesses" this class of emotions. 
The emotions all belong to a separate department of 



Nature of the Normal Faculty. 345 

man's spiritual nature. They, in part, are moved by the 
voice and actions of conscience. While we may with 
propriety say that the human soul possesses classes of 
emotions, we can scarcely say that a simple department 
outside that emotional part possesses them. Following 
out the idea of this aspect, we might land in Hume's or 
Brown's theory. In respect to the " sentiment," we do 
not see that such a term is equivalent to " a class of 
emotions." 

Wayland, in his work on the Elements of " Moral 
Science, defines the normal faculty thus:— -"By con- 
science, or the moral sense, is meant that faculty by 
which we discern the moral quality of actions, and by 
which we are capable of certain affections in respect to 
this quality" — chap. 2. Discernment of moral quality, 
and affection by that discernment, are the two things 
here attributed to the normal faculty, by which we are 
to understand its nature. We consider the definition 
defective. If you lay down a moral law, the intellect is 
capable of discerning the right or the wrong of any action 
compared with that law, and emotions are a natural 
result from certain intellectual apprehensions. The 
definition seems to lose sight of the instinctive, judicial, 
punitive, or remunerative character of the faculty. 
There is no redundancy in God's works. If the work 
done is simply intellectual and emotional, let us not 
multiply faculties for work which these departments can 
perform. We believe that there is a directive, authori- 
tative, and judicial potency belonging to this faculty 
which places it over and beyond anything properly 
belonging to the intellect or emotions. It wields both ; 
but it is distinct from and above both. The paralysis 
that has overtaken it, in consequence of the alienation 
y 



346 Christian Psychology : 

of the soul from the Creator, accounts in great measure 
for the conflicting opinions and confusion of ideas 
respecting it. Its detached operations, as the outlying 
portions of a building in partial ruins, are readily per- 
ceived ; but its internal nature, like the interior struc- 
ture of the edifice, is obscured by the accumulations of 
a moral catastrophe. 

What, then, after this general review of the opinions 
of others, is the definition which we would offer ? In 
the fewest words which we can select, we would define 
what is commonly called the conscience as — the normal, 
self -regulating faculty in the soul of man responsive to the 
moral nature of God. Or, more fully — a directing and 

JUDICIAL FACULTY EXERCISING CONTROL OVER THE WHOLE 
MAN, IN SUBSERVIENCE TO THE MORAL NATURE OF THE 

Creator, with and without a revealed law. Its 
province is morality. It embraces every department 
of duty. Man has relationships with God and his 
fellow- creatures. It is reasonable to suppose that his 
nature would be furnished with a faculty directly occu- 
pied with relations which enter so largely into the 
welfare and happiness of man. He has that faculty. He 
would be manifestly imperfect in a high degree without 
it. It promptly recognises the right and the wrong, what 
ought to be done and what ought not to be done. It is 
distinct from, but not independent of, the intellectual 
department. K\\ Apartments are vitally one, and 
mutually dependent, though some are superior and 
others inferior. The emotional nature depends largely 
for its action on the intellectual ; in like manner the 
normal faculty is largely dependent on the same depart- 
ment. And hence its diverse decisions. If the under- 
standing receives false - guidance, or is perverted, the 



Nature of the Normal Facility. 347 

normal faculty, accepting its information, may deter- 
mine accordingly. As the emotional nature varies in 
its movements according to intellectual apprehensions, 
so may the moral. There is a right and a wrong — as 
God is right and all opposition to Him wrong. That 
right is in His nature : He cannot go against it, for 
He cannot do wrong. He cannot lie, do unjustly, or 
countenance iniquity. Therefore He is self-regulated 
in the highest possible perfection, and immutable in that 
perfection. He made man in His own image : therefore 
with a perfect nature, as far as that creature capacity 
would allow. That nature must be moral — that is, 
possess a respect to right as distinguished from wrong, 
that the duties inseparable from his relation to his 
Maker and his fellow- creatures might be discharged. 
That moral perfection, as well as the Divine image, 
implied a self- regulating faculty in the absence of, and 
as altogether superior to, a written law. Man's nature 
was set to beat in unison with the Divine ; and the 
normal self-regulating faculty presiding over the whole 
spiritual machinery was what is called conscience. 

The moral nature of man is admitted ; but the 
existence of a separate or distinct normal faculty has 
been called in question. We have already met the 
different arguments that have been advanced against the 
existence of such a faculty, by ascribing the phenomena 
of conscience to intellect alone, to mere feeling, to 
education, to authority, and to habits. Other objections 
will be disposed of as we proceed. We are now to direct 
attention to inspired references to the power, authority, 
and operations of this normal faculty. Accepting the 
inspired oracles as the word of the living God, we expect 
to find man's moral nature truly delineated there — both 



348 Christian Psychology : 

what.it was, and what it is, and what it may become. 
He who made us can inform us in respect to all the 
faculties with which we are endowed. The outlines of 
a true psychology will be found in the heavenly oracles. 
As the works of nature reveal every branch of natural 
science, though in detached members scattered every- 
where over sea and land, which have to be gathered up 
and arranged with protracted labour and patience, so 
may we find scattered through the communications that 
have come from heaven to earth, detailing man's moral 
history and relations, the elements of a reliable and 
enduring spiritual science. It may require time and 
the labours of many investigators, but we have unwaver- 
ing faith in this result. The book of nature and the 
book of revelation have one author. As revelation came 
to aid man's disordered and debilitated moral nature 
in the performance of its duties, so may its light aid us 
in exploring those recesses of that nature in which 
human ingenuity has so often been perplexed. 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty. 349 



CHAPTER XXXVII. 

INSPIRED IDEAS OF A NORMAL FACULTY. 

In the divine records of creation, man's creation is 
widely distinguished from that of every other animate 
existence on earth. He is created after consultation, — 
the Almighty saying: " Let us make man," and in the 
image of God, a distinction attached to no other visible 
creature — and by a double work the formation of his 
body from the dust of the earth, and the breathing of 
the Creator upon that body, imparting by his creating 
breath or spirit a spiritual and immortal inmate to the 
material frame. Our business lies not with the exquisite 
workmanship of this material frame, but with the 
spiritual offspring of the Almighty planted within that 
frame. 

It is distinctly recorded : " So God created man in 
his own image — in the image of God created he him." 
As God is a spirit, the image of God which was bestowed 
on man, must refer exclusively to man's spiritual nature. 
Man as a spirit, a rational, moral, and immortal being, 
bore a miniature resemblance to his great spiritual 
Parent in respect to his communicable attributes. Did 
this resemblance consist in the essential attributes of 
man's spiritual nature, or in the moral rectitude which 
adorned man as first created, or in both ? — In both. 
Man resembled God not only in the possession of certain 
spiritual faculties, but in the perfection, beauty, and holi- 



350 Christian Psychology : 

ness of these faculties. By his disobedience and 
alienation from his Maker, he has lost the latter, while 
he still retains the former in their impaired state. 

What are these unimpaired faculties ? A mind, soul, 
will, and heart, in perfect adaptation to man's position 
and duties. The restored image is said by the apostle 
Paul (Eph. iv. 24 and Coll. iii. 10) to consist of know- 
ledge, righteousness, and holiness. These terms bespeak 
the result of the new creation ; they point to the effects 
of brightened vision, rectified conscience, and purified 
emotions. The soul is re-illumined to know God ; 
through this light, the faculty, whose province is 
righteousness or moral rectitude, discriminates and 
regulates ; and this habitual rectitude clothes the soul 
with a garment of holiness. The knowledge directs us 
to the enlightened intellect, the righteousness to the 
normal faculty restored to its authority and place, 
and the holiness to the emotional nature cleansed and 
ennobled by the truth. In each department the will, 
though unnoticed here, is the working potency carrying 
out the pleasure of the soul. 

If the normal faculty holds the place and authority in 
the human soul which we have ascribed to it, it cannot 
remain unnoticed in the extended records of inspiration 
which deal so largely in the moral character and doings 
of men, both as fallen and as regenerated. Its operations 
are recognised throughout the Scriptures. In many 
cases its power is the prominent influence in the soul, 
when no spiritual faculty is named. In the Old Testa- 
ment, and partially in the New, it is designated by a 
general term, " the heart." In the New Testament it 
receives a special designation " conscience ", and 
acquires great prominence, as intended to regulate the 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty. 351 

new man. Who can fail to mark its power as a judicial 
faculty, though unnamed, when Cain was accused of 
the murder of his brother, when Joseph's brethren had 
harsh treatment measured out to them in Egypt, when 
Saul was charged by Samuel with gross disobedience, 
when David was pointed to by the prophet Nathan as 
the perpetrator of the great outrage on human rights, 
when Peter was pierced by the look of his master whom 
he had just disowned, when Judas cast down the money 
which he had obtained by betraying the Lord, crying, 
" I have sinned," when Pilate strove to save Jesus from 
death, and when Felix trembled under the anticipations 
of a coming judgment. 

Leaving out certain passages (such as Job xxxviii. 36) 
which may be called in question, and which it might be 
improper here to discuss, the general Hebrew term in 
which the workings of this faculty may be broadly 
traced, is "lebh" or fully, "lebhabh" ofwhich the ordin- 
ary translation is " heart." We will notice a few instances 
in which the normal faculty is clearly referred to under 
this term : — 

In Job xxvii. 6, we read : — " My heart shall not 
reproach me so long as I live." The meaning is plain 
— the original might be rendered : — " My conscience 
upbraids me for no day of my life." We know that it is 
not the emotional nature of man that accuses of wrong- 
doing ; but something possessed of authority not per- 
taining to mere emotion. 

In 2 Sam. xxiv. 5, it is written: — "And it came 
to pass afterward that David's heart smote him, because 
he had cut off Saul's skirt." On reflecting on the deed 
which he had committed, his conscience smote him for 
what he now judges to have been a mean and unworthy 



352 Christian Psychology : 

action, beneath the dignity of a leader of thehosts of Israel. 
To some it may appear a very harmless affair, for which 
no conscience properly enlightened should disturb any 
man. To say the least, it was not honourable, and we 
may approve of David's tenderness of conscience as an 
element of true nobility, and, as employed in this 
instance, as in many others, in staying further and worse 
proceedings in the same direction. This rebuke of con- 
science aroused David to prevent his men from slaying 
Saul. 

In 2 Sam. xxiv. 10, we have another display of 
the power and authority of this judicial faculty for an 
offence of a much graver character than the last. It is 
said: — "And David's heart smote him after that he had 
numbered the people." Precisely the same terms are 
used in the original as in the last. The meaning of the 
word translated "heart" can scarcely be misunderstood 
in such cases. 

In i Kings viii. 38, we read : — " What prayer and 
supplication soever be made by any man, or by all thy 
people, Israel, which shall know every man the plague of 
his own heart." The expression " plague of his own 
heart" (iiega lebhabho), "smiting of his heart," that 
which reaches to and beats upon the heart, clearly indi- 
cates the repeated accusations of conscience, demanding 
as one knocking at a door, the attention of the man. 
For such an accused, self-condemned, and then penitent 
mortal the great King of Israel now offers an intercession. 

In Eccles. vii. 22, it is written : — " For oftentimes 
also thine own heart knoweth that thou thyself likewise 
has cursed others." This appeal to self-knowledge in 
respect to right and wrong, is an appeal to conscience. 
The normal faculty, not the emotional nature, accuses or 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty. 353 

excuses. It is not simply an appeal to memory. Memory, 
which is the soul looking back on its past doings, may 
be called into exercise ; but the abiding conviction of 
having often cursed or wished ill to real or supposed 
enemies, at once brings into prominence that department 
of the soul which deals with moral questions. 

Isai. xxxviii. 3, offers an example of the approving 
or peaceful conscience. There Hezekiah says : " Remem- 
ber now, O Lord, I beseech thee, how I have w T alked 
before thee in truth and with a perfect heart. The 
original is u-bh'lebh halem, with a heart in a peaceful 
state, sound, whole, not disturbed, that is, in the 
language of the New Testament, " with a good con- 
science." This is the ordinary state of a righteous man. 
He makes it the aim of his life to have a conscience void 
of offence before God and man. Hezekiah refers to his 
upright conduct, and appeals to the searcher of hearts in 
respect to his internal feelings in matters of duty, 
declaring that his heart, his conscience or normal faculty, 
was at peace, did not accuse him of habitually or wilfully 
neglecting any duty. No reasonable doubt can be enter- 
tained respecting this as the correct interpretation. 

We have another aspect of the operations of con- 
science in Jere. xx. 9. Jeremiah records : "Then I said, 
I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in 
his name. But his word was in my heart as a burning 
fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with for- 
bearing, and I could not stay." Here is the impelling 
power of conscience. The prophet had met with violent 
opposition, and was greatly discouraged. Under tempta- 
tion from the pelting scorn to which he was exposed, he 
hastily resolved to keep silence, to speak no more in the 



354 Christian Psychology : 

name of the Lord, and let them take their own course, 
and reap their reward. But he soon found that there 
was power within him that demanded a hearing, and 
would not be put off. David had experienced the same in 
very similar circumstances (Psal. xxxix. 1-3). This 
impelling power he compares to a fire in his very bones. 
The expression is strong, and points vividly to the 
peculiar working of conscience ; it was a fire burning, 
and yet shut up, as in his very bones, on which it seemed 
to be preying. He was called to the prophetic office in 
a trying time, and his quickened conscience, responding to 
the authority of God, would not suffer him to neglect his 
duty, notwithstanding the fierce persecution to which he 
was exposed. 

These passages are sufficient from the Old Testament. 
They reveal a faculty reproving, condemning, accusing, 
approving, and impelling. Such a faculty cannot be 
confounded with mere feeling, or with simple intelli- 
gence. It claims an oversight of duty, and it wields an 
authority over the whole man. In every instance given, 
this faculty was expressed by the term lebhabh, or the 
shorter term IcbJi, which our present version renders 
" heart." As they have not given the same rendering to 
the term at all times, but have rendered it also " under- 
standing" (Jobxii.3,&c), thereby distinguishing the facul- 
ties of the human soul in the use of the same term, an 
equal discrimination might have given the word the 
meaning " conscience " in such cases as those presented 
above, to the manifest advantage of the English reader. 
In a few instances the writers of the New Testament 
have given the equivalent of lebh in the English term 
Kuqliu (kardia), to represent this judicial faculty ; but 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Facidty. 355 

generally a special and distinct term o-uve»8>](r»£ (sund- 
ries is) is used. We shall first notice the former, and then 
group together the illustrations of the latter. 

The conviction produced by the preaching of Peter on 
the day of Pentecost, is expressed thus : " Axov<ravTz$ 
Se xuTsvvyr)(rav ty) xoigdiu " (Acts ii. 37). They were 
pierced in their heart ; or having heard, they were smitten 
at the heart. The guilt of slaying the innocent son of God, 
their own Messiah, flashed upon their minds, and their 
consciences smote them as if a dagger had entered their 
hearts. It was not mere grief that pierced them ; it was 
a sense of guilt — of great and overwhelming guilt. They 
were ready to despair, and cried out, " Men, brethren, 
what shall we do ? " Here the presence and power of 
conscience are so marked as to require no further elu- 
cidation. 

The same faculty as a condemning power is twice 
referred to in 1 John iii. 20, 21, in the use of the term 
xaodia : " For if our heart condemn us — xarayivwo-nyj 
yj/xajy yj xuqIicl — God is greater than our heart, and 
knoweth all things. Beloved, if our heart condemn us 
not " — the same phrase with the negative particle — " we 
have boldness before God." The meaning of xxgdiot 
in these verses can scarcely admit of a doubt. Man's 
emotional nature does not condemn, nor his intellectual 
nature attribute blame to him for his conduct. The term 
used for " condemn," etymologically means, " to know 
or note against," hence, to judge or condemn as guilty. 
The normal faculty notes against the soul certain pro- 
ceedings not in accordance with the normal standard of 
rectitude, and thus bars it approach, because of guilt, to 
the holy God. Hence the importance of having a con- 
science void of offence — hearts appeased, to use the 



356 Christian Psychology : 

apostle's language (verse 19), " if we would enjoy the 
countenance of the Almighty." 

But the most important passage of Scripture bearing 
on this whole question, and one which serves as a con- 
necting link between the two terms xctqbiot, and a-uvsj&i}<n$ 
is Rom. ii. 15, in which both the terms occur, the latter 
as explanatory of the former: — " Omvsf svdeixvvTai to 
egyov rov vopou yqwKTOv sv ruig xugdictig ccvtoov o-V(j,(J,agTV- 
govo-tjs ocutcjov tyj$ <rvvei$v\<rea)$ xui [xsrot^u aAArjAwv twv 
Xoyio-poov xctTYjyogovTCJOV n] Koti WKoXoyovpzvoov" which our 
version renders : — " Which show the work of the law 
written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing 
witness, and their thoughts meanwhile accusing or else 
excusing one another." The English reader is left in 
doubt whether it is the work of the law that is 
written on the heart or the law itself that is written on 
the heart. But the original shows that it is " the work" 
that is engraven on the heart. It is in accordance with 
Scripture to speak of the law itself as written on the 
heart (see Heb. viii. 10); but such is not the exact 
expression here. Hence we may properly view the text 
as presented to us. It reveals then a law external to the 
hearts of men, which, however, has left its impress on 
these hearts. What is that law but the moral nature of 
God ? The Creator has impressed on the heart or soul 
of man the law which regulates the natures of intelligent 
beings, and which is a transcript of His likeness. As 
the substance on which the law operated was not inert 
matter, but spirit, its effect was to impress or transfer its 
own guiding principles and powers to the living spirit on 
which it operated. Practically, then, the work of the 
law on the heart was the planting of a law in the soul of 
man. The work is said to be in the heart, as that term 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty. 357 

hitherto was used to express the morally regulating prin- 
ciple in man, as well as his general emotional nature. 
But its immediate explanation by another term (ruvsi5>j<rij 
"conscience ," indicates in what sense it is to be under- 
stood, and calls attention to a particular endowment of 
the human soul which is the exponent of the work of an 
original moral law. How do we know that the law — the 
normal model on which the rational creation has been 
formed — has left its impress, its work, on man's soul ? 
The conscience informs us : it bears witness. In this 
case the apostle intends to intimate that it is a conjoint 
witness. The " also" of our translation has no place in 
the original. But there is an idea implied that seems to 
justify it. The term o-v^[xugTugov<TYtg is not simply " bear- 
ing witness," but " bearing witness with" something else. 
What is that something else ? It is either the law (not 
the work of the law) or their own acts — that is, the acts 
good and evil of the Gentiles. If we suppose the former, 
it is simply that the conscience and the law speak the 
same thing — the one beats in harmony with the other, 
and they both testify to the moral nature of God, and the 
eternal distinction between right and wrong, the Divine 
nature being immutable. If we take the latter, it will be 
that the conscience, or the normal faculty, testifies along 
with the conduct or acts of these Gentiles that there is 
a moral law pervading the universe. The conduct speaks 
to the world without ; the conscience to the man within, 
and they unite in testifying to the existence of a law. 
We regard the latter interpretation as conveying the 
mind of the writer, though we do not conceal from our- 
selves that the one involves the other ; for testifying 
with conduct is testifying with a law that regulates such 
conduct. 



358 Christian Psychology: 

In the latter clause of the verse the Apostle explains 
the movements of conscience. It both accuses and 
excuses. The term Xoyic-poov is not simply " thoughts," 
as cogitations or reflections, but judicial discernments. 
The Kai " and," does not mark something in addition to 
the testimony of conscience, but something as equivalent 
to the preceding, and corresponding to our terms " that 
is," " even," "whilst" — that is, something in addition, 
but the addition is the explanation of what -precedes. 
The judgments involved an accusation of guilt or a jus- 
tification of conduct. They were not all of one class, 
but sometimes favourable and sometimes condemnatory. 
The i^sTa^u u\\rj\oov, rendered "the meanwhile," is also 
translated "between themselves." The latter is the 
literal interpretation; the former the supposed meaning. 
The idea seems to be "one with another" intermingled, 
sometimes one thing sometimes another, decisions con- 
demning and approving conduct coming in between one 
another. The whole verse may be rendered : — " Which 
show the work of the law engraven on their hearts, the 
conscience testifying with their conduct, the decisions 
condemnatory and apologetic, being intermingled one 
with another" — according as actions good or bad followed 
each other. 

Leaving the exegeties of this important passage of 
Scripture, we have to notice that there is here inspired 
authority for the opinion that there is in the soul of 
man a faculty testifying in respect to the nature of his 
conduct, and to that faculty is given the specific name 
crvvi3r}<ri$ (suneidesis), which in English is rendered 
"conscience." Whence this term? The Greeks had 
three terms which express this faculty, <rvvs(ris, o-vvei'Sog, 
and o-vvbi$vi<ri$. The first, literally meaning a coming 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty. 359 

together, is often used for the understanding ; but that 
it also means the conscience the following extracts from 
Euripides will show. Eurip. Ores., 395, Menelaus 
asks : — " What thing do you suffer ?" as we say, " what 
is the matter ? " And adds : — " What disease destroys 
you ?" Orestes answers : — " rj cruvsens on (ruvoila dsivv 
z^qycitrpsvoc" — " Conscience, for I am conscious that I 
have been doing dreadful things." The other two are 
from criivoj&a, the perfect for the present, there being no 
<rvvsi$oo in use. The noun <juvsi^(rig appears in the Apo- 
cryphal Book of Wisdom, 17 ch. 11 v.: — AsiAov yaq 
tiicog 7roVYigia [xaqruqsi xciTcidixu%o[j,EVYi aei $s 'Kqoaeik^s tcl 
p£«A=7ra (tvvs^o[xsvyi rvj o-yvs/o^crei — " For wickedness con- 
demned of its own nature testifies that it is a fearful 
thing, and pressed by conscience has ever anticipated 
distresses." It is found in the New Testament some 
thirty times, being used by Luke, John, Peter, 
and Paul, the last employing the word in his 
Epistles not less than twenty-four times, and in 
seven different Epistles. From this bare enumeration 
it will appear that it has acquired a prominence in 
Christian ethics which will not suffer it to be over- 
looked, and which claims for it a full investigation. 
The genuineness of the clause in which the term occurs 
in the gospel of John (viii. 9) has been called in question, 
but apparently without sufficient cause. It is wanting 
in many MSS. But as the term nuist have been in fre- 
quent use at the time when John wrote his gospel, it is 
more likely to have been omitted by some than to have 
been inserted by others, and seems necessary to give a 
completeness to the passage. Luke in his history of the 
Acts uses it twice (Acts xxiii. 1, xxiv. 16) in reporting 
Paul's self-vindication. It occurs three times in the 



360 Christian Psychology : 

first epistle of Peter (1 Peter ii. 19, iii. 16, iii. 21). It is in 
constant use in the writings of the apostle of the Gentiles. 
An examination of the passages will reveal some of the 
chief offices of this faculty, as well as the degrees of 
vitality and authority to which it may be subject. 

Conscience appears as an accusing power, speaking of 
guilt and condemnation under the moral government of a 
holy God, in Hebrews ix. 9, 14 ; x. 2, 22. Sinners burdened 
with guilt under the accusations of conscience, are 
excluded from the presence, and incapacitated for the 
service of God. On the other hand, it is presented to us 
as an approving, peace-speaking faculty, in Acts xxiii. 1 ; 
Timothy i. 5, 19, 3, 9 ; Hebrews xiii, 18 ; 1 Peter iii. 16, 
21. The Apostle represents the christian as seeking to 
secure at all times the approbation of an enlightened con- 
science as something of great value, of which no good 
man can be deprived, and asserts that such was the aim 
and the practice of himself and his fellow labourers. 

Again, this normal faculty is exhibited as endowed 
with an impelling force, urging to duty — Rom. xiii. 5 ; 
1 Peter ii. 19. And again as a restraining power — 1 Cor. 
viii. 7-12. Christians are to yield submission to a lawful 
power from a sense of right, that is, in obedience to 
the regulating principle implanted in their consti- 
tution by their Creator ; at the same time the very 
respect which they pay to their own consciences should 
induce them to respec* the consciences of others (1 Cor. 
viii. 7-12). The conscience decides according to the 
light which it may have. To one person a deed may 
appear wrong, which to another appears harmless ; 
hence a respect for the convictions of conscience is 
inculcated even when these convictions may be founded 
in ignorance. 



Inspired Ideas of a Normal Faculty. 361 

It is spoken of as the controlling power in the upright 
man. Acts xxiv. 16; 1 Cor. x. 25-29 ; 2 Tim. i. 3. And 
again, as attesting to his integrity or sincerity, Rom. ix. 1 ; 
2 Cor. i. 12, v. 11. The righteous man strives to live 
according to the mind of God, so far as he can ascertain 
it. In so doing, the power of conscience will be felt 
restraining him from evil, and thereby controlling his 
conduct ; and in yielding obedience to its dictates he 
receives in return an attestation of approval. 

Again, it is appealed to as a judicial authority capable 
of judging in matters of honesty and dishonesty, sincerity 
and craft, in 2 Cor. iv. 2 ; and lastly, it is spoken of as 
seared, deadened, insensible, or defiled, and so incompe- 
tent to occupy the judicial seat, as a judge whose 
discrimination had failed through intellectual infirmity. 
1 Tim. iv. 2, and Titus i. 15. 

Here we have a power accusing and approving, 
impelling and restraining, controlling and then attesting, 
judicial, and then by harsh usage and violence rendered 
insensible. With such varied proofs of special, direct, 
vigorous, and authoritative action, that system of psy- 
chology must appear radically defective which denies a 
high and distinct position to this faculty, or declines to 
investigate its peculiar and complicated phenomena. 
To some who claim to rank among philosophers, a 
reference to Scripture may seem out of place in such 
questions. When, we ask, have the sacred writers been 
proved mental imbeciles ? When have their writings 
been judged devoid of profound thought by any capable 
of entering into their meaning ? Is their neglect a proof 
of wisdom or of folly by men who pride themselves on 
mastering the most obscure fragments of the writings of 
ancient profane authors ? Wherein is Plato superior to 
z 



362 Christian Psychology : 

Paul, or Aristotle to John ? Who that has studied both 
will not declare that Plato and Aristotle, with their great 
and unquestioned intellectual power, are immeasurably 
surpassed on the field of high morality by the two 
mentioned writers of the New Testament ? The time 
has gone by for that philosophy which would ignore the 
ethics of Paul and John ; and above all of that great 
Light, God manifest in the flesh. While we recognise 
the great natural endowments of many of the sacred 
writers, and claim on this ground for their writings the 
profound investigation of the intellectual, we may not 
overlook the important truth that they were inspired by 
the Holy Ghost to reveal the true state of man's soul 
before God, the law which should regulate his life, the 
influence which alone can restore the power of obedience 
to that law, and the blessed consequences which attend 
a compliance with the divine will. In giving due promi- 
nence to the ideas of men so richly endowed by nature 
and grace, we are adopting a course which in the end 
must receive confirmation from the aggregate of human 
experience. 



Original Design and Authority. 363 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 

ORIGINAL DESIGN AND AUTHORITY. 

From the testimonies of Scripture above referred to, as 
well as from the lessons of human experience, we may 
safely conclude that the almighty Creator in endowing 
the soul of man with this faculty, designed to plant 
within him a regulative authority clothed with judicial 
powers. This regulative authority was practically legis- 
lative. It did not make the law, but it was the bearer 
and the expounder of the law. It was not an indepen- 
dent authority ; but the chief official of the supreme 
legislative authority of the universe. Clearly, if we 
allow any distinction of place among the faculties of a 
spirit which is indivisible and a unit, this faculty is the 
head and chief of all, as no power within the soul can 
take precedence of the directive and judicial. Through 
it the all-ruling Spirit that fills immensity exercises his 
regulative and controlling influence over the human 
soul. Every door is open at his approach ; he can touch 
the intellectual and emotional nature of man at his will, 
and does influence both ; but this faculty is the estab- 
lished point of contact by which the created spirit is 
made to feel both the authority and the determinations of 
the almighty Ruler. Balanced at first, or set in perfect 
harmony with the nature of God, it became moreover his 
agent in preserving the soul in conformity to that nature. 
Acquiescence with its native impulses diffused a healthful 



364 Christian Psychology : 

glow of delight over the whole soul, as the enjoyment 
of an exercise in which life luxuriates, but it marked 
the slightest deviation from the point of rectitude as a 
violence put upon it, as a jarring of the spiritual 
machinery by the dislocation of the main axis from its 
socket, and sent a feeling of distress and alarm through 
the whole spirit. God is present with all his intelligent 
creatures, but he does not destroy their free agency. 
He is more closely intimate with the innocent and 
upright, dwelling in them, but he does not supersede 
their natural faculties. When man was innocent God 
dwelt with him ; this faculty then held the soul for God as 
under his eye. To try man his Maker withdrew his 
special sustaining presence, leaving him to the free 
exercise of all his faculties, among which the normal 
was supreme. The pressure of a superior intellect, 
operating under the guise of friendship, overcame the 
resistance of this regulating power, and induced a trans- 
gression of the divine command. We are constrained 
to believe that our most benevolent Creator would not 
place man in a hopeless condition of temptation : and 
therefore that man either had in his own resources 
sufficient strength to resist the urgency of Satanic 
pressure, great as it was, or the power to evade the 
force of the temptation by keeping away from the place 
of danger, or had within call the divine assistance 
which is never denied to the upright in the path of duty. 
The fallen angel could not be permitted to force man to 
transgress the laws. The deed must be the voluntary 
decision of the soul. Man was free to give heed to argu- 
ments, or to turn away from them. An argument that 
hinted at disobedience should have been discarded with- 
out examination. Its full force should not be allowed to 



Original Design and Authority. 365 

come upon the soul. Hence the command of scripture — 
" Resist the devil and he will flee from you." Great as 
his power is, it is only when we enter into temptation — 
that is, when we entertain it — that its power can be 
felt in its overbearing influence, and through it 
the power of the adversary. The triumph of the Fall 
was not won in a moment. The man was not deceived. 
If he was tempted previously, the temptation was suc- 
cessfully resisted under the admonition of conscience. 
The woman was deceived by specious arguments, and 
her conscience was either overborne or her whole spirit 
was spell-bound as by a fascination — a power acquired 
over her by the tempter, by her voluntary entertainment 
of his evil suggestions. It required a double pressure 
to persuade man. The first reason given by his Maker 
for his condemnation is, — " Because thou hast listened 
to the voice of thy wife." He knew what he was doing, 
and the entreaty of his wife was aided by the pressure 
of the evil spirit : both secured what we must conceive 
was a reluctant consent. The disobedient pair had 
done violence to their whole spiritual nature specially to 
the normal faculty, which now accused, condemned, and 
scourged them as if it belonged to a power external to 
themselves and had no sympathy with them in their 
misery. This peculiarity of conscience must never be 
overlooked. It is not only the chief point of connection 
between the Creating and the created spirit, but it is a 
fort or stronghold in the intelligent creature which the 
supreme Ruler never surrenders, although his inter- 
course with it may be temporarily suspended. How far 
the movements and inflictions of conscience are due to 
the natural workings of this faculty, and how far they 
are attributable to the presence and power of the 
Almighty working through it, it is impossible for human 



366 Christian Psychology : 

ingenuity to determine. If we attribute them wholly to 
human nature, we must endow this faculty with a sensi- 
tiveness, a power, and a vitality, altogether remarkable. 
It is more reasonable to suppose that the ever-present 
Being, who reads all our thoughts and motives, not 
unfrequently employs this faculty to present to the soul 
His view of the deed or design, and his judgment con- 
cerning it. In these cases there will be a vividness, a 
power, and a persistency in the impressions and move- 
ments wholly unusual. 

Everywhere, and at all times, this faculty is a witness 
to the existence of a superior moral Ruler. As man is 
not self-created, he must have had a Maker greatly 
his superior. As work reveals the character of the 
worker, man's moral nature reveals a moral Creator. 
Man need not go beyond his nature to know that there 
is a God, an intelligent and good Being, and a moral 
Ruler to whom he is accountable, and to whose nature 
certain things are pleasing, and certain things highly 
displeasing ; and as a result, certain things agreeable to 
the creature, and certain things painful in the extreme. 

We may conclude that all rational creatures are 
endowed with this faculty, both as the organ or point of 
connection with God as their Ruler, and as a power for 
preserving, controlling, rewarding, or punishing them. 
We see a restraining moral power in the angels, when 
they durst not imitate a bad example, by railing in 
return for false aspersions. Jude 9, 2 Peter ii. 11. 
And we see the terrors of an accusing faculty in the 
outcry of the devils against our Saviour for a supposed 
premature torment. Matt. viii. 29. 

The first work of the normal faculty in the rational 
creature, as he comes forth upright from the hands of 
the Creator, is to preserve the soul in harmony and 



Original Design and Authority. $6j 

peace with God. This is accomplished by a double 
movement. Obedience to the Divine will is commended 
and rewarded with joy. And a warning voice on the 
appearance of evil as a temptation, to restrain the soul 
from touching it. As the warm and balmy breezes of 
spring diffuse a healthful glow through the human frame, 
so does the breath of an approving conscience warm and 
refresh the righteous soul. And as the eye closes on the 
approach of danger — real or apparent — threatening its 
safety, and the hand is instinctively withdrawn from 
what threatens to scorch it, so does this faculty warn 
and restrain on the appearance or approach of moral 
danger. But this preserving power is limited. It failed 
in the trial of our first parents, and it failed in the trial 
of a higher race of beings. This implies that rational 
creatures, so far as known to us, are created fallible. 
They acquire a permanent stability in rectitude when 
they have proved their fidelity to God by obedience 
and, it may be, by the resistance of evil. Though many 
have fallen, many have retained their high position of 
integrity. For aught we know, the vast majority have 
passed the trial with honour. The probability lies in 
favour of this conclusion, for the original inclination of 
all as created, every power of the soul, and specially the 
faculty of which we write, is in favour of obedience. 
The existence of evil has its origin in a mystery to us 
unfathomable ; but the design of its limited sway is 
sufficiently intelligible in the manifestation of the glory, 
— that is, the various perfections of Jehovah. 

When the responsible creature has passed over to the 
position of a sinner or a rebel against God, conscience 
assumes a new aspect. It suffers in common with all 
the faculties in an interruption of the vitalizing and 



368 Christian Psychology : 

invigorating influence of the great Invisible, but it 
retains power sufficient when aroused to shake the soul 
with extreme distress. Its assumed independence of the 
soul is somewhat remarkable. It will approve, and it will 
condemn, as if it owed allegiance to some superior power, 
whose agent it was, and whose rights it would maintain. 
The inclinations of the soul being habitually evil, its 
chief exercise assumes the form of a varied antagonism 
to the designs and doings of most men. Here we may 
quote the words of Juvenal, Sat. 13, 2 : " Prima est haec 
ultio, quod, se judice, nemo nocens, absolvitur." " This is 
the first revenge that, the person himself being judge, no 
guilty one is absolved." This faculty within is the judge, 
not the whole soul ; for within there may be varied 
efforts to find excuses, and to evade the force of the 
accusation. But conscience sets up before the soul the 
deed that has been done, and says, in a tone that can 
admit of no reply, You have done this deed, and you are 
guilty. We are far from saying that conscience is always 
right ; but when it is right beyond dispute, it is hard to 
resist its authority. That it is sometimes wrong is a 
proof of the interruption of the Divine connection, and 
hence it cannot be regarded either as a safe guide at all 
times, or as a supreme authority in matters of right and 
wrong. What was practicable in the days of health is 
often found impossible in the days of sickness. What 
was accurately done under the supervision and imme- 
diate control of a master, will often be inaccurately done 
when the worker is deprived of that supervision and aid. 
Conscience, with God dwelling in the soul, was fully 
competent for every duty required from it ; but con- 
science deprived of that presence gives frequent proof 
of its incapacity and weakness. 



Original Design and Authority. 369 

The capacities of this faculty show that it was endowed 
by the Creator under a clear perception of the require- 
ments of a sinful state. It was fitted to serve Him and 
benefit the rational creature not only in a state of inno- 
cence and righteousness, but in a state of guilt and cor- 
ruption. It does much more to preserve the authority 
of God, and prevent the overflowing of unrighteousness 
on this earth, than men are disposed to recognise. As the 
apprehension and conviction of offenders against the 
civil law of a country tends to deter men from the com- 
mission of crime, so the very general apprehension of 
self by this police force when evil has been committed, 
and the conviction which is the ordinary result, renders 
it most undesirable for the soul to transgress a second 
time in the same way, from the certainty of self punish- 
ment with increased severity. And as the civil force of 
a community sometimes comes upon the plotters of a 
scheme of wickedness before it has been carried into 
execution, as in the infamous gun-powder plot of a.d. 
1605, so conscience lays its arrest upon an evil design by 
sternly denouncing the project, and threatening condign 
punishment should it be carried into practice. Man 
does not willingly listen to an accusation of guilt, either 
from a voice within or without. His self-esteem is 
wounded. It is an attempt to drag him down from a 
seat of honour, and to place him in the box of the 
criminal. He will resist such an attempt. Hence the 
task of the normal faculty in a sinful creature is generally 
unpleasant ; and if it did not possess considerable power 
and authority, its accusations would be summarily put 
down. But it is prepared for opposition, and fitted to 
make good its position. If the deed has been done it 
cannot be denied to this internal accuser, however fre- 



37<D Christian Psychology : 

quently it may be denied to external accusers. Any 
attempt to palm off a deception on conscience is instantly- 
torn into shreds — the man abandons the attempt and 
falls back on excuses of weakness, temptation, provoca- 
tion, and such like ; but the deed is not denied within, 
whatever may be said to those without. Having at 
times full control of the spirit, conscience brings up the 
past, spreads out the scene, details all the circumstances, 
and dwells on each stage of the proceeding, until the 
soul exclaims "lam guilty : O what shall I do ?" The 
faculty takes for granted that the deed is wrong, that 
it is in contravention of law ; and it is only when the 
surmise is entertained that no law has been transgressed 
that a search is made into the records of law. Here the 
whole information in the possession of the soul is 
brought into service. The man, well informed in laws 
human and divine, will have a test applied without 
delay, to confirm or rebut the charge of conscience. The 
man not possessed of this training, is tossed with per- 
plexities, till past experience, human authority, or, above 
all, the innate power of this moral arbiter, decide the 
case. When the guilt is established, and the soul 
stands convicted at the bar of conscience the former 
accuser and witness-bringer mounts the tribunal as 
deputy-judge, and pronounces a coming judgment. The 
sinner is ever made to feel that he has to do with some 
mighty ruler and judge, external to himself, of whom 
this internal voice now gives notice, and whom it claims 
to represent. Conscience never professes to be the 
final judge; but it is ever cahing attention to a future 
judgment, the nature of which it professes to indicate. 
By acting the part of a deputy-judge, and pronouncing 
beforehand the future decision, it may both cheer and 



Original Design and Authority. $J I 

strengthen the soul of the just and benevolent, and sadden 
and depress the mind of the false and the cruel. It 
thus in part anticipates a future retribution. It so far 
rewards and punishes, by personal internal feelings, on 
which the life and happiness of men so much depend. 
Inflexible justice is in it ; it seems to know no mercy. It 
will soothe, and comfort, and uphold by assuring the 
man of the favour of a supreme Being when he has done 
well ; but it will be as resolutely adverse and punitive 
when evil has been done. Compassion for the sinner 
as a sufferer is ignored. It incessantly justifies the 
punishment when it is a due reward for iniquity. When 
quickened and brought into direct contact with the 
almighty Spirit, its power to repeat, and enforce the 
justice of, the sentence pronounced on the sinner defies 
resistance, and the soul sinks writhingly under its lashes. 
Hence, it is clear, that while it constitutes a part of man's 
spiritual being, it claims to belong to God more than to 
man — to be more God's servant than man's — and will 
take part for or against man, as man is for or against God. 
It will comfort man in extreme distress if suffering for 
God ; but, so far from comforting him in similar trouble 
when suffering justly for his sins, it will add its whole 
weight to the scourge, and terribly augment the pain. 
In vain will poor man look to it for sympathy when 
paying the penalty of his crimes. God has so constituted 
man that he carries in himself a rewarder and a punisher 
greater than any creature can be to him, and inferior only 
to God himself. 

If these statements correctly represent human expe- 
rience it is plain that the original design of the Creator 
in bestowing such a faculty on man was that there should 
be in man at all times and in all conditions a witness to 



372 Christian Psychology : 

the existence of God and of his moral government, with 
which witness, as a normal faculty, the supreme Ruler 
would hold intercourse at such times and to what extent 
He pleased ; that this faculty should to the innocent and 
obedient be a preserver and a rewarder, and that to the 
guilty and disobedient it should be, so far as their wicked- 
ness extended, an accuser, judge, and punisher, as anti- 
cipating but not superseding His own judicial proceedings 
and that during the period of forbearance allowed to the 
sinner it might exercise a powerful restraint on the pre- 
valence of ungodliness ; but that when final judgment 
had overtaken the transgressor, it might enforce the 
justice of the Divine displeasure beyond the power of 
dispute. 

The question here arises, what is the authority of 
conscience ? Is it supreme ? Ought it always to be 
obeyed ? It is not absolutely supreme, nor should it 
always be obeyed. It cannot make right wrong, nor 
wrong right. If man had retained his integrity it could 
claim universal obedience, for it would ever have spoken 
the voice of God, as God would have retained his closest 
vital connection with the soul of man. Or if in the spiritual 
fall it had remained upright, retaining in full its connec- 
tion with God, and through that its light and power, it 
might still claim general and constant obedience ; but it 
has suffered by the fall ; the whole soul of man has been 
deprived of the gracious presence of its Maker; and the 
normal faculty has frequently shown by its torpidity, 
weakness, or perversity, that it does not always represent 
the will of God. It has a delegated or official authority. 
When it speaks the mind of its Superior it carries His 
authority with it ; when it speaks the mind of another, 
as the folly and superstition of man, it carries no such 



Original Design and Authority. 373 

authority, and may without guilt, but not without incon- 
venience, be disregarded. It possesses power, and for- 
midable power, even when not speaking the mind of 
God, as some officials, when going beyond or contravening 
the orders of their superior ; and disobedience to them 
may occasion not a little trouble before the judgment of 
the superior can be heard. It is not enough to have 
conscience on our side. It may give us confidence, but 
not safety, as the peace which the perverts to a false 
religion profess to have. We must have the Lord of 
conscience with us also, or conscience enlightened and 
moved to speak the mind of God, when we shall have 
both safety and peace. Right is right, independent of any 
decision of conscience ; and no urgency of conscience 
can make that which is in itself wrong, or opposed to the 
nature or mind of God, to be right. Hence we may call 
in question the decisions of this faculty. Man, as a fallen 
being, is far from being infallible ; and the light that is 
in him, paradoxical as it may appear, may be proved to 
be great darkness. The greater the power of the normal 
faculty to soothe or alarm, the greater the care that 
should be taken to regulate it by the light of eternal 
truth. It comes then to this, that the regulator has to be 
regulated. It was set in brightness and beauty at first by 
the great Architect, in His exquisite spiritual mechanism 
of the human soul ; but the deluge of sin has stained and 
corroded it, darkened its lustre, and impeded its action. 
Revelation has come to supply its defects. Since man 
has fallen the conscience-voice in man has not been 
uniform. Its decisions depend largely on the degree of 
light in the individual. Hence it can not be regarded 
as the universal standard of right or wrong in many 
details of duty. It has universal decisions which are the 



374 Christian Psychology : 

voice both of nature and of God, and before which both 
civilized and savage are constrained to bow ; but in the 
details of duty it lamentably fails. The infinite mercy of 
God has met our wants by writing on a visible page the 
full details of that law of which conscience was once an 
adequate exponent. As the present condition of the 
normal faculty is of great practical importance it will 
deserve a particular examination. 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 375 



CHAPTER XXXIX. 

PRESENT CONDITION OF THE NORMAL FACULTY, 

To form a correct opinion of the Normal faculty, we 
must view it in several distinct moods or conditions. 
It will be impossible to exhibit every phase which it may 
assume ; but we may illustrate certain states which 
have acquired a degree of permanency. The mountain 
torrent does not change its channel every day, but only 
under the influence of severe storms. In like manner the 
Normal faculty delights to move in acquired grooves. 
And as the trade-winds which blow steadily in one 
direction for months, so this power is often felt steadily 
directing the soul to one line of conduct which it has 
stamped with its approval. It is, however, very fre- 
quently in the back ground, allowing the other endow- 
ments of the soul apparently to manage affairs as they 
see fit. In a large ship with many officers, we may, in 
ordinary weather see little of the captain, for his subor- 
dinates are charged with the management of the routine 
work ; but let a violent gale spring up, or the ship be 
brought into extreme danger, and the responsible head, 
if worthy of his position, will at once be seen and heard 
in every part of his command. So conscience, in the 
ordinary duties of every day life, may be much out of 
sight ; but let questions of right or wrong, of truth or 
falsehood, of justice or injustice, be forced upon the 
attention of the man by high authority or impressive 
circumstances, then it comes forward to assert its claims 



376 Christian Psychology : 

to obedience. It is not always, however, that the soul 
captain, like the ship captain, is sufficiently prompt to 
meet, or sufficiently strong to avert, the impending 
danger. 

The operations of conscience are neither constant 
nor perfect. Yet we can recognise the value of even 
occasional and imperfect service. The man who has 
lost his legs may yet support himself by the diligent use 
of his hands. He who is too old and stiff to keep watch 
on the mast head, may yet do good service in steering 
the ship, or sounding the alarm to man the defences on 
the approach of the enemy. The guide who may not 
know the whole way through the forest, may conduct us 
to a half-way house, where another may be found. Let 
us appreciate the service that can be performed, while we 
carefully discover what is wanting. We have more 
reason to complain of error and of unfaithfulness than 
of simple defect. When the conscience, professing to 
be a watchman, falls asleep at its post and allows the 
enemy to enter, without sounding an alarm ; when pro- 
fessing to be a guide it leads astray in the midst of 
danger ; or when assuming to decide for the right, 
through ignorance and mental deception, it perverts 
right judgment ; then we have occasion to question its 
claims, and condemn its misdoings. Hence it is of 
moment to apprehend with some degree of clearness the 
capacity or inefficiency, the rectitude or the perversity of 
the normal faculty, when summoned to follow its guid- 
ance. To facilitate this apprehension, we will notice 
some of the ordinary states or conditions in which 
conscience comes under our cognizance. These we 
enumerate as the Unenlighted, the Perverted, the 
Torpid, the Troubled, and the Quiescent. 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. $77 

1. The Unenlightened. — Light in the conscience 
attends light in the mind. If the intellect or mind is in 
darkness, so is the conscience. But the conscience is 
not dependent on the intellect for its action ; for it may 
operate in the midst of great intellectual darkness. When 
the mind has light it belongs to the whole man ; the 
conscience shares in the common benefit. The normal 
faculty works with and without what is properly regarded 
as mental and spiritual illumination, in the highest refine- 
ment, and in the grossest barbarism. In distinguishing 
the Unenlightened conscience, we see it working amongst 
the rudest tribes of heathendom, among enlightened or 
educated heathen, among those who enjoy the civilization 
of Christianity, and among those who have become the 
subjects of regenerating grace, but are yet in comparative 
ignorance. To these the term "unenlightened" is appli- 
cable in common, though in very different degrees. 

If we closely examine the legislation and conduct of 
the most barbarous tribes of our race, we may discover 
the rude outlines of that law which was many centuries 
ago written by the finger of God on tables of stone, and 
handed to the Hebrew legislator. The first three Com- 
mandments refer to the acknowledgement, worship, and 
reverence of one supreme God. All the heathen have 
some supreme invisible deity of whom they stand in 
awe, whom they seek to worship to the best of their 
knowledge, whose name they reverence, and whose 
rights they carefully respect. The fourth Command- 
ment requires the observance of a particular portion of 
time as sacred to the supreme Being. All the heathen 
have their appointed seasons for religious worship, 
which seasons are regulated by the heavenly orbs which 
rule the day and night. The other six Commandments 

AA 



378 Christian Psychology : 

point to respect to parental and constituted authority, 
to the evil of destroying human life, to the maintenance 
of conjugal rights, to the claims of personal property, to 
the preservation of truth, and to the restraint of unjust 
desires to acquire what does not belong to us. Every 
one of these laws is in some respects acknowledged by 
the human normal faculty in the breast of the untutored 
savage. They may not have been able to give them a 
written form, but they often appeared in the public dis- 
cussions held in their councils, their palavers, koreros, 
or corroborees. Respect was granted to their chiefs, 
the loss of life demanded retaliation, interference with 
marriage obligations produced revenge not easily 
appeased, theft was punishable in more ways than one, 
lying was condemned as dishonourable, and efforts to 
acquire by improper means what belonged to another 
received general reprobation. Whence these principles 
of rectitude ? They are the fruits of conscience — the 
law written on the human heart. They are not the 
fruits of a mere intellectual examination of the fitness of 
things, or of what is due to the welfare of society ; but 
they are the results of a moral regulative power common 
to all, and therefore acknowledged by all. Laws are 
useful ; they have an efficacy when there is a power in 
every man's heart testifying to their justice and demand- 
ing obedience to them. In the absence of education the 
sentiments uttered in the general councils became the 
subjects of consideration in every private dwelling, and 
helped to train the youthful and inexperienced to a 
recognition of what was right in general public 
estimation. 

When literature obtained a footing, the laws social, 
moral, religious, and national, would acquire a written 



Present Condition of the Normal Facility. 379 

and visible form. With the increase of light, conscience 
could enforce its claims with more power. The informa- 
tion respecting duty being present to the mind, or 
presented in so many impressive forms, a departure from 
what was enjoined by law would the more easily be 
detected. The laws occupy a place in the history of all 
civilised nations of antiquity. Their domain is the 
domain of conscience. Had they been perfect, and the 
soul of man fully competent to apprehend them, no com- 
plaint could be made that the normal faculty wanted 
light for the path of duty. But they were not perfect, for 
they were in great part the product of unaided reason ; 
and if they had been given by inspiration of God, the 
mind of man could not fully understand them without 
divine illumination. Hence conscience, greatly benefitted 
by written laws and mental culture, v/as still defective 
by want of perfect light. Inspiration changed the moral 
aspect of the earth. God again spoke to man. He gave 
him that knowledge of himself which was essential to 
right worship, and service ; and he gave him that 
apprehension of man's rights which taught him to act 
justly and kindly to his fellow creature. Moses was 
inspired by God to frame laws for the regulation of a 
religious people. The prophets, raised up in the Hebrew 
nation, expounded and enforced these laws, and foretold 
an era when the laws of Jehovah would regulate the 
conduct of the whole human family. The advent of the 
Messiah, the God-man, was the dawning of a new day of 
greater light. The old law was not repealed, for it was 
founded on the principles of eternal right ; but it was 
explained and enforced in a higher dejree, requiring the 
careful regulation of the thoughts and of the desires by 
the strongest motives of God's love in the mission of his 



380 Christian Psychology : 

Son, his own character, and the salvation involved in the 
possession of holiness. The complete revelation of the 
divine will has become a part of the literature of several 
nations, and their habits and laws have been largely 
influenced directly and indirectly by it. Its light has thus 
far reached the ordinary conscience. We do not forget 
that in some nations professing to be not only civilized, 
but christian, this perfect revelation has been put beyond 
the reach of the common people, and its general use 
forbidden by those who profess to enlighten the souls of 
men in the matter of salvation, a crime of deepest dye, 
an injury to man, and an unspeakable loss to society ; 
and that in lands where this Book, Heaven's standard of 
morality, suffers no restriction in its freest circulation, 
there are many who are grossly ignorant of its contents, 
having never read a page of it, nor heard its holy words 
explained ; but yet the morality of Christendom has been 
influenced to a greater or less extent by the possession 
of the heavenly oracles, and so far the moral faculty has 
shared in this supernatural light. The voice now heard 
from heaven has not contradicted the voice within that 
has spoken in all ages, and among all nations, but con- 
firms, strengthens, and adds to that internal testimony. 
While the voice within spoke of law and justice, heaven's 
voice without repeats in clearer tones the same truths, 
but adds what conscience never could discover, the 
message of mercy, a discovery of free sovereign grace to 
guilty and perishing man. Is not this light sufficient ? 
What more can be wanting ? What are the facts ? 
Many share but dimly in this light, from neglecting 
to peruse the Bible for themselves. Others who do 
use it are unable fully to understand it, and say, with 
the eunuch of Ethiopia, " How can I understand it 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 381 

without some one to explain it ? " More light is 
needed. The light of human experience, and still 
more, the illumination of the Holy Ghost. He who 
studies most the sacred oracles will often repeat the 
prayer, " Open thou mine eyes that I may behold 
wondrous things out of thy law." The highest light 
which the conscience can receive is the illumination of 
the spirit of God. This is an endowment of unspeakable 
value. How earnestly should man pant after it ! How 
eagerly should he prize it ! What can equal wisdom ! 
But what can rival this light ? How shall we estimate 
its value ? O, that the fountain of material light would 
pour his spiritual radiance into the souls of universal 
humanity ! This light has been granted to many, but in 
different degrees. As the powers of eyesight differ in 
many, so in the powers of spiritual discernment. Many 
need more light who are the children of light. Hence 
this defective illumination leaves a partially unen- 
lightened conscience. Such a condition is not desirable. 
It is found often extremely troublesome. The soul may 
be said to have more sensibility than knowledge. 
Conscience will see things wrong which others more 
enlightened justly consider to be right. Let it be trained, 
not forced. It is unwise to do violence to moral convic- 
tions. A tender conscience is often of great value. Give 
it full light, and obedience to its demands will be followed 
by peace flowing like a river. 

2. The Perverted. — In this case a double injury is 
inflicted on the human soul. The intellect or under- 
standing is deceived, so that it apprehends things in false 
relations, and is taught to call evil good, and good 
evil ; and, influenced by this falsely-taught intellect, the 



382 Christian Psychology : 

normal faculty impels to the doing of what is in itself 
wrong, and accuses and condemns when that wrong, 
supposed to be a duty, is not performed ; and restrains 
the man from what is in itself good, under the conviction 
that it is a moral wrong. The importance of correct 
moral instruction is at once apparent. The conscience 
may be so perverted by a wrong education that it may 
prompt to the doing of what the conscience of the 
untutored savage, left to the guidance of the voice of 
nature, would restrain him from doing. We may per- 
vert a spiritual faculty, as we can pervert the natural 
action of a physical limb. The arm of the human body 
is made to hang down, but its muscular action may be 
so perverted by being held continuously up, that it may 
be impossible for it to resume its natural position without 
extreme pain. 

A few illustrations may elucidate this condition. A 
man may be so taught by heathen priests or so trained 
by heathen parents that he may look upon a block of 
wood or stone with great reverence and awe, as the 
representative of an invisible and supreme power. A 
proposal to deface or maim that block would instantly 
call forth the strong resistance of conscience. The man 
would abhor the doing of such an act as a great crime, 
as a direct insult to the deity. We know that such 
an act in other circumstances, with the light that revela- 
tion casts on the worship of images, might be regarded 
as not only harmless but commendable as a significant 
proof of the entire abandonment of the sin of idolatry. 
The same heathen may have been so trained as to bring 
at stated times presents and offerings to the idol. Let 
something interfere with the customary visit and dona- 
tion so that it has been neglected at the proper time, 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 383 

how will conscience act ? It will upbraid, accuse, and 
condemn for the neglect of an important duty in the 
judgment of the individual. But what is the truth ? 
Conscience is upbraiding for not doing what is in reality 
a sin, however the man may tread the path of duty. 
Sin is unchangeable in its character. Duty is often 
changeable ; but what is in itself wrong, being in oppo- 
sition to the nature and revealed will of God, is eternally 
wrong in all places and under all circumstances. Our 
duty is not regulated by our light, but our culpability 
may be, when the darkness is not the result of our own 
personal action. Idolatry has its sacred days. Should 
an idolator yield to the temptation of wages, and work 
on a day set apart for the honour of the local deity, we 
can understand what internal trouble his own conscience 
may give him for this supposed profanation. He was 
setting up his personal interests before the honour of 
his god, and such a proceeding never passes uncon- 
demned by a conscience possessed of sensibility. In all 
this we can see that the acknowledgment and worship 
and service of a supreme Being is the point to which 
conscience is aiming ; its great mistake, its perversion 
is that it has come down with a darkened understanding 
from high and adequate conceptions of the great, invisi- 
ble, and glorious Jehovah to the worship and service of 
the mere creation of the human imagination. 

The perversion of the normal faculty in respect to the 
duties which man owes to his fellow-man is somewhat 
different. In the former case the being, character, and 
worship of God was misapprehended by the intellect, 
which led to the perversion of the regulating faculty. In 
this case man and his claims are well known, and hence 
the perversion of conscience does not arise from ignor- 



384 Christian Psychology: 

ance, but from giving the supposed good to be obtained 
a preponderance over the evil demanded as the means 
for its attainment. The very depths of cunning are 
embraced in this principle. It is embodied in the well- 
known sentence recorded in Scripture : — u Let us do 
evil that good may come ;" and in the modern phrase : 
— " The end justifies the means." The evil is admitted, 
and thereby conscience is allured to anticipate no wrong, 
and the good is magnified that it may fill the soul, over- 
shadow the evil, and in a manner totally alter its 
character. If the evil still rises up, that is, if conscience 
still hesitates, the good to be reached is weighed with 
it before the eyes of the mind, and the preponderance of 
good is made to appear so marked as to constrain the 
conscience not only to consent, but it may be to give 
the man no rest till the good is reached even by such 
unjustifiable means. We know nothing more fitted to 
secure the commission of sin, nothing more fitted to 
subvert the moral nature of man. The author of this 
device is the devil. It is the acme of his sagacity in 
the seduction to moral turpitude. It succeeded with 
our first parents. It was the good to be attained — the 
equality with God — that overbalanced the sin involved 
in disobedience. The Pharisees taught the same prin- 
ciple in their perversion of the fifth Commandment. 
And the followers of Ignatius Loyola have interwoven 
this principle through a system of morals which com- 
pletely upsets the morality enjoined by heaven. Take 
some illustrations of the systematic destruction of man's 
moral nature and of God's authority over him. 

The law of God requires obedience to those who are 
in authority, whether parents, masters, or rulers, when 
that obedience is not contrary to the word of God. But 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 385 

the morality to which we refer professes to absolve from 
that obedience, and enjoins disobedience, on the ground 
of the benefit that will follow to their church. In this 
way the authority of the church, or a section of the 
church, is placed above the word of God, and the 
conscience is trained to regard the voice of the 
church as authoritatively proclaiming the mind of 
God, when in reality it is not only superseding it 
but is directly antagonistic to it. In the same way 
the revolting crime of murder in the form of assassi- 
nation is made to secure the support of conscience. 
This deed is so opposed to the natural influence and 
bias of conscience that it requires strong discipline to 
bring it into complete subjection to such gross immor- 
ality. For this end special pains are taken to show the 
good that must result to the church from the removal 
from the earth of such a man ; and the benefit is so 
weighed with the sin that the latter is cast into 
the shade as utterly insignificant compared with the 
good results ; it may be represented as but the 
loss of one soul compared with hundreds ; until at 
last, like the deluded mortal that assassinated the Prince 
of Orange, the man cannot rest till the deed is per- 
formed or he perishes in the attempt. How sadly is 
this powerful faculty perverted when it may impel a man 
to do, as a good deed, what nature, reason, and revela- 
tion, with one voice, loudly condemn as a revolting 
crime. If we advance to the seventh command of the 
decalogue, we shall find that the Jesuit moralists are 
prepared to silence all accusations of conscience in 
respect to the breach of it, if certain circumstances are 
allowed. By a species of dexterous hair-splitting, for 
it does not deserve to be called reasoning, the inconve- 



386 Christian Psychology : 

niences and difficulties, and disabilities arising from 
certain restraints are enumerated, and then the possi- 
bilities of greater sins than the one contemplated, 
resulting from a variety of imaginable consequences of 
not yielding to the tempting opportunity ; the mind, 
naturally prone to sin, is trained to view the deed as it 
wishes to view it, as stripped of its deformity, and 
adorned as a real and allowable good ; and advancing a 
step farther, it is led to regard the restraints that have 
been imposed by society as an unjust restriction, and 
therefore that the deed of licentiousness is but a resump- 
tion of right. Thus by a variety of pretences, and 
by progressive stages, the mind is taught to regard sin 
as no sin. The conscience will excuse the deed by the 
Jesuit maxim ; the less of two evils has been chosen ; 
and it will be no wonder if it reach the full length of 
the path of degradation by justifying sins condemned by 
this command, on the plea of natural right. If the diffi- 
culties of this command can be got over, it is compara- 
tively easy to find excuses for the breach of the other 
three. What harm can it be to appropriate the property 
of a heretic, if the mind is trained to regard such a man 
as devoid of all claim to any earthly possession, not 
excluding life itself ? Surely theft is no theft ! Conscience 
may tolerate such mischievous designs. If the would-be 
thief is a servant, may he not appropriate to himself his 
master's property, on the plea that he is only taking his 
own, not having received what he conceives to be suffi- 
cient wages for his service. Such morality is actually 
taught by the conscience-perverters to whom we have 
referred. The solemnity of an oath disappears under 
their manipulation, for faith is not to be kept with 
heretics. When the man breaks his oath, an ordinary 



Present Condition of the No until Faculty. 387 

conscience is aroused to charge the soul with great guilt, 
but so perverted may the conscience become under such 
moulding that the man may have no peace of mind until 
he has broken the oath, because the oath is now regarded 
as a great sin. Ordinary lying may be made to appear 
as a virtue, and receive the approbation of conscience, 
because certain results said to be beneficial flow from it. 
And as for covetousness, its repulsive aspect, when 
closely inspected, as the mother of many enormities, may 
be so changed as to wear a most attractive countenance, 
a saintly mein, and a heavenly garb. Then conscience 
— deluded conscience — says, Go near and embrace 
her, she will do you good and not evil. Every sin 
against God or man may be so dressed up by human 
ingenuity, aided by the experience of past ages, that it 
will be made to appear totally different from what it really 
is, and if the reality can be concealed from the mind, and 
the apparent accepted as true, the conscience may, in the 
course of time, be brought, against its original inclination, 
not only to acquiesce in the doing of what is notoriously 
wrong, but to impel to the commission of great crimes. 
It sanctions or impels to nothing as wrong, though it 
may be violently wrong or sinful. The wrong must be 
made to appear the right, then, and then only can it 
secure the approbation of conscience. When thus 
deranged or seduced from the realities of right and 
wrong, it is perverted. 

3. Torpid. — In this state the normal faculty is dull, 
dormant, unfeeling, seared. The torpidity exists in 
various stages, from drowsiness to deep sleep, from 
partial insensibility to an entire loss of feeling, from 
temporary sluggishness to confirmed torpidity. It is not 



388 Christian Psychology : 

natural, it is acquired. The street robber puts his hand 
upon the mouth of his victim lest he should give an 
alarm; the surgeon binds firmly the limb whose muscles 
must remain for some time unmoved ; and the patient is 
dosed with sedatives when acute sensibility would be 
destroyed. Natural speech, action, and feeling are 
restrained or destroyed. So it happens with the normal 
faculty. Its voice is hushed by stifling violently its 
remonstrance. Its action is obstructed, when it would 
bar the progress of the sinner in the path of destruction. 
The policeman is kept back until the purpose of mis- 
chief is accomplished. And a less violent, more insi- 
dious, and more dangerous expedient is resorted to when 
the conscience is set asleep by the steady instilling of 
plausible but fatally false doctrines. This stifling and 
benumbing work is not accomplished in a day. It is 
often extended over years, it may be the greater part of 
a lifetime. The difficulty is proportionate to the 
amount of resistance arising from the superior enlighten- 
ment of the understanding, and consequent vitality or 
activity of the conscience, and the facility is propor- 
tionate to the power of the repressive agency that may 
be steadily and perseveringly employed. The perfect 
and continuous benumbing of conscience is rare. Sea- 
sons of torpidity, on the other hand, are very common. 
It is not the enormity of any one crime that prostrates 
the power of conscience, for the shock sustained by the 
soul gazing on some unusual crime or folly of great mag- 
nitude which it has perpetrated, or by the discovery of 
such crime or folly by the world, often arouses the 
normal faculty from the stupor in which it long lay, and 
restores a vitality and energy such as had not been 
experienced for years. Just as a drowsy traveller, driven 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 389 

under cover of night, may be lulled asleep by the ordin- 
ary rattling of the coach ; but is immediately awaked 
by a sudden jolt that has almost capsized the convey- 
ance. The drowsiness has fled and will not return by a 
simple effort of the will. Conscience will not be quieted 
for some time to come after such an awakening. It 
sometimes happens that the Holy Spirit, grieved by 
man, withdraws the restraint against which the soul had 
chafed, and permits such a fall as will arouse the man to 
a sense of the course of sin which he has been pursuing. 
A strictly moral education in early life increases the 
activity and power of conscience, and will retard the 
benumbing process of a life of sin. On the other hand, a 
youth spent in the utter neglect of moral discipline leaves 
a conscience an easy prey to the repressing power of bad 
habits. In like manner, torpidity may be prevented or 
accelerated by frequenting the faithful ministrations of 
God's word, or by totally avoiding them. The man who 
wishes to keep awake will not be averse to the striking 
of the clock — the man who wishes to sleep will depre- 
cate the slightest disturbance. 

Torpidity of conscience may be produced in three 
ways. First, by a continual engrossment in worldly 
business. In this a man generally sets one object before 
him, and makes all else bend to that. It may be at one 
time buying, at another time selling ; at one time 
planting, at another, reaping. The pursuit is allowed 
to absorb the energies of the man, to the exclusion of 
all other considerations. He has no time for anything 
else. When conscience would say, Let me speak a 
little, the reply is, I cannot hear you just now. When 
it would hint some unfair dealing, some sharp practice, 
some extortion, some incorrect calculations, some unjust 



390 Christian Psychology : 

accounts, it is answered by a promise of future consider- 
ation when it can find time. In the meantime he persists 
in putting self- aggrandisement above every other subject 
of thought, and says to conscience as to all others when 
it would threaten to retard the soul in its grand purpose, 
Stand aside, and speak when I invite you. Conscience 
is overborne. It is crowded out. Its authority is not 
denied, but it is repressed. Its direction is not sought, 
and its interference is resented as somewhat impertinent. 
Like one calling at a public office, the chief officer 
answers the request for an interview with a message that 
he is specially engaged just now, and invites to call 
again. The call is repeated at a short interval, when the 
officer is found to be not less occupied than before. The 
process is repeated, with the same result. The conclu- 
sion is soon reached, that the interview is not desired, 
and that the officer will avoid it if he can. The visitor 
will cease to call, unless some business of pressing per- 
sonal interest will demand it. Or like a partial judge, the 
man will hear any witness but the one whose testimony 
will be most damaging to the cause which he favours, and 
he frames one excuse after another to prevent his testi- 
mony from being heard till the hour of adjournment 
puts an end to the business for the day. There is a 
promise, and it may be a prospect, of a future hearing 
and attention, and with this it may be more difficult to 
deal than with a point blank refusal. The normal 
faculty at length grows dull and drowsy in waiting, and 
at last falls asleep, and permits the man to pursue his 
chosen course undisturbed. He has turned his back to 
the cataract towards which he is rapidly gliding, and 
refusing to look forward because of the smooth waters 
and green banks now seen on either side, he will awake 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 391 

to his danger by the rough tossings which immediately 
precede the fatal plunge, but awake when escape is im- 
possible. 

Second, the normal faculty grows torpid under the 
persistent repression of a course of active wickedness. 
In this, opposition to conscience is more marked than 
in the former. It is not, " I will hear you again " ; but, 
" I will not hear you at all." In many cases no excuse 
can be framed for the evil deed, and the sinner promptly 
refuses to hear conscience. It is not, however, an easy 
matter to escape from so close and so importunate an appli- 
cant. In single combat conscience will compel a hearing. 
The man then rushes for help to gay and wicked com- 
panions, to scenes of amusement, or to the stupidity 
of intoxication. Sheltered behind these, he escapes many 
of the strokes of conscience. Another occasion will find 
him linked with wicked companions in the perpetration 
of evil, when the attempt will be made to meet the accu- 
sations of conscience by a division of the guilt, or some 
other equally worthless expedient. One sin makes way 
for another. Where a man could not plant his foot 
without sinking, we may soon place a ton weight with- 
out depression. The heart grows hard by perpetual 
sinning. For a time the man proves too strong for 
his faithful monitor within. The love of sin, unlaw- 
ful gain, unholy pleasure, prevails over the normal 
regulating faculty, set originally in harmony with the 
holy nature of the Creator. The mastering of the one 
is the humiliation of the other. As the one grows strong 
the other becomes weak. Conscience that would at 
one time have made the man's face as crimson for the 
stealing of a penny, leaves him without a pang for the 
fraudulent appropriation of thousands of pounds. When 



392 Christian Psychology : 

crime began its course, a stroke with the fist called 
forth an inward rebuke, but at length the deadly thrust 
with the assassin's dagger awakens no remorse. In early 
youth the neglect of prayer night or morning had been 
followed by a disturbed feeling not easily set at rest ; 
but now grown old in sin, profanity, Sabbath-breaking, 
and open licentiousness are prosecuted with callous in- 
difference. Continuous repression of speech by persistent 
sinning has resulted in deep silence, but it is the stillness 
which precedes the hurricane. A steady depression of 
the branch which once pointed heavenward is followed by 
a permanent bent downwards to the earth. A powerful 
reanimation can alone restore it to its original position. 
Self-confidence has discarded the brake on the wheels of 
life ; and now in the shades of approaching night, and 
on the steep declivities of old age, it cannot be brought 
into action, and the driver must face the consequences 
of his folly in irretrievable ruin. 

Third, the silence and slumber of conscience is 
secured by false doctrines. Let a man persuade himself 
that there is no such thing as sin, that what men call 
offences against God are only the weaknesses of human 
nature, that man is not immortal, that there is no future 
world, that the dissolution of the body is the end of 
existence, and that man has nothing more to look to but 
his own individual happiness while he can live, he 
will not fail to rebuke the voice of conscience as a 
silly weakness of which he must get rid, as one of the 
trammels of superstition or a false education imposed 
on him by ignorant though well-meaning instructors. 
The task will not be so easy as he may imagine. When 
he supposes that he has heard the last of an inward 
accuser, he finds, on the perpetration of some folly, a 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 393 

self-accusation rising anew to disturb him. The 
cherished opinions of others so contrary to his own, 
will give countenance to the voice within. He will 
unavoidably meet from time to time what will militate 
strongly against his unnatural process, and retard the 
consummation on which his heart is set. But he may 
succeed at length. By avoiding the light, by refusing 
to read the Bible or attend the house of prayer, b}^ 
fondly cherishing every idea in favour of his theories, 
he may bring himself to believe what he desires to 
believe, and for a time the silence of a torpid conscience 
may reign within. But the delusion vanishes with the 
lifting up of the pall of night ; and the light of eternity 
revealing a guilty soul and a sin-avenging God, con- 
science awakes to sleep no more, and its imposed 
restraints removed, it assumes the post of an unsilence- 
able accuser and an unpitying tormentor. 

4. Troubled. — When trouble begins, torpidity ends. 
But there may be trouble without previous torpidity. 
The human soul is familiar with the trouble of an 
accusing conscience. It may be the ruffle of a passing 
breeze, or the continuous heaving of a prolonged tem- 
pest. With many the days of storm greatly outnumber 
the days of calm. What produces this agitation, distress, 
and alarm ? A sense of guilt for duties neglected or posi- 
tive sins committed. Conscience does not trouble a man 
for the sins of others. He may be distressed in connection 
with the sin of another, but if his conscience has origi- 
nated the distress, it is because he has had some share 
in the guilt by exposing the fallen to temptation, or 
countenancing in some form what has resulted in the 
crime. It is just so far as he has been one of the con- 

BB 



394 Christian Psychology : 

tributing causes to the evil result that his conscience 
charges him with guilt, and occasions internal distress. 
It is possible that a tender conscience may go farther. 
A question may be started such as this — " What have 
I done to prevent such crimes ? Might I not have hung 
a lamp near that pit into which the thief has fallen ? 
Might I not have set up a fence on the edge of that cliff 
over which the drunkard has staggered ? " If we are 
troubled for our many positive sins, what shall we say 
to the charge of our innumerable sins of neglect ? Sins 
of omission are acts of disobedience. Each command 
has a double face. It requires a man to do, and 
not to do. The command not to kill, is also a com- 
mand to take great care of life. The command not 
to commit adultery is a command to preserve purity of 
thought, speech, and action. The command not to make 
a false oath is a command to speak the truth with all 
fairness and accuracy. If a man limit his conception of 
any command to the special act condemned, he may 
have an idea of his innocence totally aside from the 
truth. He may have peace of conscience from his 
ignorance, but it is a false peace. It" is from a true 
apprehension of the spirituality and extent of the divine 
law that a troubled conscience often springs. How can it 
be otherwise ? Who can estimate the number of his 
errors ? A man may turn his eyes away from them, but 
that will not diminish their number, nor prevent his 
appearance at the bar of judgment to answer for them. 

Parental neglect has allowed a youth to break the 
Sabbath and go with bad companions. It has proved 
the ruin of the youth, and has planted a thorn in the 
conscience of the parent which cannot be extracted. 
Or a girl has disregarded the earnest admonitions of her 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 395 

mother, and forms a connection against the parent's 
will. She has gained her object, but has also secured a 
troubled conscience, from which she cannot relieve 
herself. 

Inhumanity has turned a poor beggar from the door 
without a particle of food. The starving wanderer has 
sought the shelter of an out-house, and exhausted nature 
has sunk into the silence of death. The beggar will 
knock no more at the door, but another monitor will 
repeat his knocks from time to time on the memory of 
the cold-hearted mortal. 

Cruelty has refused a widow's request to allow her a 
little time to secure a shelter for herself and her little 
ones, before she is turned out from the house which she 
once called her own, but of which fraud has now deprived 
her. The house is abandoned, but the proprietor has 
secured more than the property — a troubled conscience 
makes it a dear possession. 

Base selfishness and cowardice have impelled the 
captain and crew of a steamer disabled and sinking, to 
escape from death by taking the only boat, and leaving 
the passengers to perish. They may have thought that 
as dead men tell no tales their heartlessness would never 
be known, and they could form their own tale on reach- 
ing the land. Several perished, but a few were floated 
ashore on a piece of the wreck. The crew were all 
saved, but the outcries of those abandoned to death' by 
them did not cease with their drowning voice, but 
found a response in the conscience of the cowardly 
crew from which it was a hard task to free themselves. 

Culpable sloth has loitered by the way when life and 
honor demanded haste. Relief has come, but it is too 
late. The city has surrendered to the foe ; death has 



396 Christian Psychology : 

seized its victim, and its grasp cannot be relaxed. One 
hour sooner and all would be saved. Two hours might 
have been saved by a refusal to turn aside from the way 
to enjoy a mis-timed hospitality. Who. is guilty ? What 
will conscience continue to say for many a long day on 
the mention of the name of the deceased. 

Who can enumerate the sources of trouble from 
positive transgressions ? They are like the sands on 
the sea shore, innumerable. When our first parents 
transgressed the law of God they were troubled in con- 
science, and when they heard the voice of God calling 
to them, they trembled even in their hiding-place. 
When their first-born son murdered his brother, his 
inward distraction was great, as seen from his answers 
given to God. The remembrance of Jacob's deception 
greatly troubled him in the prospect of meeting with 
Esau on his return to Canaan. When Joseph's brethren 
were harshly treated in Egypt they were reminded of the 
cruel treatment shown to their brother when they sold 
him as a slave for that very country, and their con- 
science smote them afresh for their wickedness as it 
had often done before. When Achan saw the lots cast 
to discover who had appropriated the accursed spoil of 
Jericho, and found the dissevering lines approaching 
nearer and nearer himself, he must have felt the eye of 
God upon him and that his sin was before his eyes. 
So felt the prophet Jonah, when standing among sailors 
on the deck of the tossing ship. He saw the lot come 
out against him. Though conscious of guilt, a manly 
courage seized him, and he was ready to brave death 
rather than see all hands perish on his account. When 
Elisha looked Gehazi in the face and asked him, on his 
return from his lying expedition after Naaman the 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 397 

Syrian, whither he had gone, he mustered up courage 
to reply, " Nowhere !" But when his master presented 
the whole scene of his pursuit of the Syrian, his troubled 
conscience came out in the downcast look, and in 
this case the crimson of shame gave place to the 
whiteness of leprosy. How troubled in conscience was 
Judas when he saw that his Master was condemned 
to die. He may not have anticipated any such result 
from the betrayal. He loved money more than his 
Master ; and he may have expected that the chief 
priests would lose their money, and their prey would 
easily escape their grasp, as he had often done before. 
But this was not to be, and Judas must have known 
that his Master often foretold his death at the hands 
of the Jews. If his conscience had been dumb during 
the short interval of trial, which we do not imagine, it 
spoke in tones of thunder when he saw him condemned 
and led away to Pilate, with a demand for his execution. 
The wretched betrayer was overwhelmed in the sea of 
his trouble. 

But distress of conscience is not confined to the 
wicked. When the righteous go astray their trouble of 
mind is often extreme. What distress could surpass 
that of David, when fully aroused to the enormity of his 
guilt ? How often did Peter mourn his denial of his 
Master ? How was Saul of Tarsus troubled in con- 
science during those three days and three nights in 
which he neither eat nor drank, but spent the time 
praying in sadness of heart and in the gloom of blind- 
ness. He had been a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a 
participator in the guilt of murder. But, without 
descending to the level of great transgressions, how 
often are the truly godly troubled in mind by reason of 



398 Christian Psychology : 

many shortcomings and neglects. They see what others 
do not, and are distressed by what occasions no trouble 
to less enlightened and less sensitive minds. 

A troubled conscience has frequently led to the dis- 
covery of sin and the confession of guilt. It creates a 
feeling of anxiety and alarm that cannot always be con- 
cealed. An unusual whistle in a crowd has turned the 
head of a criminal and led to his arrest on suspicion. 
Curiosity might have led to the same result, but there was 
in his look something more than curiosity, and led the 
experienced detective at once to mark the man. Some- 
times the demands of conscience will not be satisfied until 
the slanderer has made full confession, until the thief has 
made full restoration, and until the murderer has sur- 
rendered himself and received the due reward of his 
crime. It is well for society that the normal faculty 
does not totally lose its power, and it is often well for 
the individual that he is thus reminded of his guilt, that 
he may repent and seek forgiveness and do works meet 
for repentance before he appears at the bar of the great 
Judge. Conscience may unnecessarily occasion dis- 
tress, but its admonitions are almost ever the just 
indications of contracted guilt in some form. 

5. Quiescent. — We distinguish the quiescent state 
from the torpid. The one is a natural, and, it may be, 
legitimate repose ; the other is an unnatural and con- 
strained stillness. As a guardian, the normal faculty 
sits at rest and smiles approbation when all duty is 
faithfully and regularly performed. This quiet com- 
placence depends upon the light possessed and followed 
by the soul. The conscience may err in speaking peace 
when in truth the soul has not peace with the great King ; 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 399 

and it may destroy rest and peace when in truth there is 
no call for the disquietude and trouble. If duty is not 
attended to, as apprehended by the soul, the rest is dis- 
turbed; conscience is agitated, and will give the soul no 
peace. If sin is committed a similar result ensues. 
Hence we may see how the quiescent state is restored 
and maintained. Let duty be discharged according 
to obligation, and the conscience which had risen 
to reprove, resumes its seat in quietness. If sin has 
been committed or injury sustained by a fellow man, 
conscience refuses to let the soul rest till satisfaction 
has been rendered. A false statement has been made 
before a human tribunal ; this faculty speaks authorita- 
tively to the man, and says, " You must go and recall 
that statement ; you must acknowledge your error, and 
remove the false impression, and if you do not, I will 
continue to scourge you, and give you no rest.'' Con- 
science is obeyed, and the judge within expresses satis- 
faction. A fraud has been committed. A fellow man 
has been deprived of a certain sum justly belonging to 
him, and a receipt has been obtained for a full dis- 
charge. But conscience refuses to discharge the man. 
It says, " There is a sum which you have not paid, and 
yet you have marked it down as paid. I will not sit still, 
nor will I suffer you to rest till you go and rectify that 
account, and restore to the man what belongs to him." 
The dishonest man may attempt to reason with his 
conscience. He may silence it by constraint and the 
pressure of business. But it refuses its acquiescence, and 
utters, under the constraint imposed, a threat that it will 
speak again of this matter when it cannot be put off. It 
is not unlikely that the man in such circumstances will 
promise a future rectification of the mistake, in order to 



400 Christian Psychology : 

secure present peace. A man has lost his life by what 
some may call an accident. But the event touches the 
conscience of one deeply concerned. He presented a 
gun to the deceased, and pulled the trigger, not thinking 
that the gun was loaded, and shot the man dead. A 
widow and family have been left unprovided for. What 
now can be done to repair the loss ? Conscience will not 
suffer the man who was the instrument of this misfor- 
tune and loss to rest till he has done what he can, both 
to console and relieve the bereaved family. When all is 
done that can be done, it may be said to be appeased, 
but not satisfied. The heedlessness or recklessness 
that could so endanger life has left a sting behind 
which will be felt for years to come. 

When God is the offended party, conscience demands 
satisfaction before it will consent to rest. If promises 
of future amendment will not be accepted for the past, 
recourse is taken to expressions of regret, and the ques- 
tion is asked, " What reparation can I make for the evil 
that I have done ? " All the religious knowledge pos- 
sessed by the man is then pressed into service, to give 
advice in this serious condition. If the man believes in 
the priestly authority of the church of Rome, he will 
go and confess his sins to the priest, do penance, pay the 
required sums for special masses, secure the intercession 
of the priest with supernal powers, and receive absolu- 
tion for all the past. It may be that he will now return 
home with a light heart, his conscience having, in the 
darkness of his mind, accepted the combined services as 
satisfactory. But if he has enjoyed the illumination of 
scripture, he will know that every sin deserves God's wrath 
and curse, both in this life and that which is to come, 
that no services now performed can make up for past 



Present Condition of the Normal Faculty. 401 

neglect, seeing that they are all required for the present, 
that no mere sorrow for sin can meet the demands of 
justice which calls for punishment on the offender, as no 
human government accepts the mere regrets of a culprit 
as an atonement for his crime, that the punishment 
demanded is nothing short of eternal banishment from 
the presence of God, and that if the past were for- 
given, all his experience goes to prove that he would 
speedily incur again the same wrath and curse for sin — 
and hence he is shut up to the conclusion, " I am 
undone, I cannot save myself; no man, himself a sinner, 
can save me. God be merciful to me." But can God 
show mercy when his truth and justice bar the door of 
the sinner's prison ? These bars cannot be broken, nor 
can the sinner remove them. We are at a stand. Con- 
science knows no mercy ; it sees no way of escape. 
Then the sinners Friend, Immanuel, appears. He offers 
satisfaction. His atoning blood, his meritorious death 
is set opposite in the divine record to the demands for 
death to the sinner. His righteousness, in a life of perfect 
obedience to the divine law, is offered in the room of the 
perfect obedience demanded from the creature. This is 
what gives rest to the conscience. A sacrifice that can 
take away sin, for it makes full amends for the dishonour 
done to God; and can assuage wrath, for it grants all 
that justice can demand ; and can liberate the con- 
demned, for it glorifies the truth of God, meets every 
possible claim of the enlightened conscience for satisfac- 
tion for the past. Conscience asks, " Is that sacrifice 
yours ? ; ' The sinner replies, " I have made it my own 
by accepting as a gift what I could never purchase, and 
what was freely offered." Conscience exclaims, " I am 



402 Christian Psychology : 

satisfied, I am indeed satisfied," and settles down into 
profound but joyful quiescence. 

But this rest is yet to be disturbed. The heart of 
man is prone to sin. He is surrounded by tempters, 
and falls under their influence. Then conscience again 
accuses, and with a bitterness unknown before. The 
accusations are met by a fresh acceptance of the merits 
of the sacrifice, still within the sinners reach, and again 
conscience resumes the quiescent state. This is repeated 
as often as the consciousness of guilt distresses the soul. 
But more is wanted than satisfaction for transgression. 
The law demands a full and constant obedience. Con- 
science condemns defective obedience. The Lord our 
Righteousness is again the sinner's refuge. He offers 
not only atonement, but the robe of perfect obedience ; 
the sinner accepts this robe, and clothing himself with 
it, presents himself before conscience. Satisfied beyond 
expression and delighted, the conscience breathes the 
most perfect acquiescence. Let mortal man hold fast 
this faith, and the gc od conscience which follows a 
faithful performance of its duties, and his peace may 
flow like a river, and Lis righteousness be as the waves 
of the sea. 



Its Restoration by Grace. 403 



CHAPTER XL. 

ITS RESTORATION BY GRACE. 

The whole animate material creation exhibits, when 
injured, powers of self-restoration within certain limits. 
Beyond these limits, the injury proves fatal to the plant 
or animal, unless aided by some power external to itself. 
You may cut off the branch of a tree, but it may be 
replaced by the tree sending forth another equally large, 
closely contiguous to the root of the amputated member. 
You may curtail its dimensions by cutting its branches 
all around, but its power of self- restoration may in a few 
months more than repair the injury. You may wound 
it severely by cutting into its trunk, but it may maintain 
its vitality, heal the wound, and cover from sight the 
scar, by the production of new wood ; you may even 
cut off some of its main roots, but if you leave others, it 
will continue to grow and send out fresh roots to seek 
nourishment in the place of those of which it has been 
deprived. But the process of diminution or of wounding 
may be carried too far. If you cut off all the branches 
it may die, although the trunk is uninjured. The loss 
of the whole breathing apparatus at a certain season of 
the year may reduce the vitality beyond the power of 
restoration. The constitution receives a shock, as an 
animal frame under a severe amputation from which it 
cannot rally. The branches may be left untouched, but 
if you girdle the tree, and thus prevent the sap from 



404 Christian Psychology : 

ascending, it will die. The same result will follow a too 
great deprivation of the roots. It need scarcely be 
remarked that some trees and vegetables have im- 
mensely greater powers of vitality than others. The 
leaf-less limb of a willow tree, if not deprived of its sap, 
will take root if driven into congenial soul. And the 
lowly but valuable strawberry plant will display great 
tenacity of life after its roots have been split and torn 
by continuous transplanting. But there is a point in 
each plant beyond which vitality recedes, under injuries 
received, till life is extinct, when the utmost attention 
and culture prove futile. 

If an animal is wounded, the vital fluid is immediately 
directed to the wounded part to repair the injury. If 
the blood is pure, and not weakened or poisoned by the 
use of alcohol, unwholesome food, or impure air, the 
healing process proceeds rapidly, if within the power of 
nature's unaided resources. Nature, within her own 
province, is the best physician. But her powers of 
restoration are restricted. The amputated limb will not 
grow again. The remaining one may acquire additional 
skill and aptitude by practice ; but the lost cannot be 
replaced. The branch that is cut off does not again 
grow at the point of excision, but near to it. When 
hearing is lost nature seeks to repair, in some measure, 
the defect, by increasing the ocular discernment ; and, 
when sight is lost, by increasing the power of hearing. 
When a bone is broken it will grow together if fairly 
set and properly bandaged. Here the necessity for 
aid becomes manifest. Within a certain limit nature 
will restore unaided ; within a wider circle it will heal 
and build up when receiving intelligent assistance. A 
wound may be received from which the sufferer will 



Its Restoration by Grace 405 

bleed to death if aid is not afforded, for nature cannot 
stop the flow from every wound. The internal system 
may be so obstructed by widely distributed impurities 
and poisons that it cannot, unaided, throw off the dis- 
ease ; but give it assistance, without superseding its 
proper action, and health may be restored. 

Does this law of self-restoration, unaided and aided, 
which pervades the animate material world, both vege- 
table and animal, extend to the spiritual ? Reasoning 
from analog)', we should conclude that it does, within 
certain limits. That as wounds, injuries, or defects of 
an external or superficial character, and of a limited 
internal nature, may thus be cured in the vegetable or 
animal, so certain defects or injuries affecting some of the 
faculties of the immaterial spirit, such as the emotional 
or intellectual, may be restored and cured by the inhe- 
rent vitality and energy of the spirit, aided or unaided. 
And as a severe wound to the vegetable, and a simple 
piercing of the brain or heart of the animal, may exceed 
all the restorative power of such animate existence, so 
an injury may be inflicted on some chief department or 
faculty of the spirit, from which no restoration can be 
found within the resources of the spirit. As the human 
soul in this life operates through a material frame, what- 
ever affects that frame favourably or unfavourably so far 
affects the soul. A diseased stomach or liver will so far 
influence the brain, through impure blood and sympathy 
of action, as to affect materially the emotional and 
intellectual powers ; while a heavy stroke on the head 
will paralyse all mental effort, if it do not destroy the 
connection between mind and body. If mental derange- 
ment, intellectual or emotional, is the effect of disease in 
the material organs, the removal of the disease is the 



406 Christian Psychology : 

restoration of the mind to a normal and healthy state. 
So far the law of self-restoration operates in the man as 
a spiritual being. 

It is when we consider the spirit as removed from a 
material frame that the difficulty of determining the 
operation of this law begins. Experience here fails us. 
We can only reason from analogy. Can we conceive of 
an intellectual or emotional defect or injury befalling a 
pure spirit, which defect or injury may be remedied or 
cured in the exercise of that spirit's own powers, or with 
the aid of some other pure created spirit ? Is the moral 
nature alone incurable by creature effort ? Can the 
intellectual and emotional be injured without the moral 
being affected ? The injury of the moral affects the 
whole soul ; can as much be said of either of the other 
departments ? These questions are shrouded in mystery. 
We know that holy angels contend with unholy angels 
without a loss of integrity or purity, but we know not 
how far other powers may be impaired in the conflict. 
Their strength is limited. They are not almighty, and 
hence their strength may fail under the assault of a 
superior power, unless succored by their great Captain. 
If capable of exhaustion or wounding, reason may con- 
clude that they possess, while the moral nature remains 
untouched, a recuperative and restorative power. We 
can go no further. 

Man's moral nature has been wounded, deeply woun- 
ded. All experience proves this. Is this wound fatal ? 
We have seen that certain wounds, such as injuries to 
brain or heart, transcend the restorative powers both of 
animal nature and of rational skill as possessed by the 
creature. Is the injury sustained by man's moral nature 
of that class that all the skill and energy displayed by 



Its Restoration by Grace. 407 

humanity have failed to repair it ? We may say that it 
is. As no sinless mortal has yet been seen on this earth 
since Adam's moral nature was first smitten by sin, we 
may conclude that the wound is incurable by human 
ingenuity and power. The dislocation cannot be adjusted 
by human strength. The heavenly magnetism that drew 
the soul Godward cannot be restored by created skill. 
The disease which has penetrated the soul is not remov- 
able by any earthly physician. But does it defy creative 
skill ? Impossible. He who has made can certainly 
remake. Infinite power is guided by infinite wisdom ; 
and infinite wisdom is ever in accordance with infinite 
goodness and truth. If truth and holiness, in other 
words, the moral nature of God, do not bar the exercise 
of power, infinite wisdom can find a way for the outgoing 
of that power for the accomplishment of the desired end. 
If not only within the power, but within the truth and 
holiness of God to restore the fallen soul of man, is it 
probable that he would so far interest himself in his 
fallen creature as to exercise, in a legitimate way, his 
wisdom and power for man's spiritual recovery ? It is 
not improbable, provided his own glory is promoted 
thereby. He exercised creative power and skill for his 
own glory in the formation of man ; for the same grand 
end the exercise might be repeated. He glorified himself 
in giving life at first ; he might restore life when lost if 
his own glory would be equally or more fully displayed. 
His goodness is manifest everywhere. Pity is an element 
in goodness. Might it not find an outgoing towards this 
fallen race if truth and justice opened the way. The 
injury was not an accident. It was a self-inflicted wound 
in direct disobedience to express orders. Punishment 
was threatened for disobedience ; and truth demands that 



408 Christian Psychology : 

it should be inflicted, How then can man escape ? 
Who can heal his wound ? 

The case was peculiar. The man stood not only for 
himself, but all his posterity ; and hence countless 
millions were plunged into misery and woe by his dis- 
obedience. Of these a vast multitude have been uncon- 
scious infants. Here was a state of helpless misery 
fitted to touch infinite compassion. If one could bring 
so much misery on many — could not one occupy a 
similar representative position, bear the punishment and 
repair the injury ? It is done. Let Immanuel deliver his 
own message : " God so loved the world that he gave 
his only begotton Son, that whosoever believeth on him 
should not perish, but have everlasting life." What a 
shout of welcome should the earth raise to such a 
a visitant ! How eagerly should the glad tidings be 
accepted, and passed along from shore to shore, and 
round and round our globe, till every corner was filled 
with the joyful sound ! 

We open the sacred volume, and ask how is the 
normal faculty restored to its original place and power ? 
The answer is given : " God, who at first commanded 
the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our 
hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of 
God in the face of Jesus Christ." The work is attributed 
to the original fountain of light, the restorer of order, and 
the infuser of life. The Holy Spirit is the first cause 
of these marvellous effects. To Him belongs the glory of 
ordering and beautifying the spiritual creation. And if 
the preparation of the earth for the abode of man was a 
restoration of order subsequent to a previous order that 
existed, wherein there was a primal display of vegetable 
and animal life of great luxuriance, but which was over- 



Its Restoration by Grace. 409 

thrown by great internal convulsions, as geology would 
seem to indicate; this restoration of the soul of man to 
a state of order, fitting it for loyal subjection to the 
glorious dominion of Him who is the second Adam, 
Son of God, and son of man, after a violent spiritual 
overthrow, which followed a brief but glorious display of 
intellectual and spiritual life, has had a striking illustration 
and analogy in the material operations of the great Spirit. 

The restoration is spoken of as an illumination, a 
birth, and a creation. These terms illustrate distinct 
features of the work. There is light, for knowledge and 
truth attend the goings of God. He is light, and his 
gracious presence diffuses light wherever he goes. The 
birth is an entrance on a new state of existence. It 
pre-supposes life, both the infusion of life, and the opera- 
tion of life external to the person born. Life is infused, 
or, speaking of man as one with the original fountain 
of humanity, restored by the Spirit, who gave life to all 
animated existence, and the revived or quickened soul 
is brought out of darkness into the light of a new world 
— the kingdom of God. There is then the creation, that 
is, a reforming or restoration, after the secondary sense 
of the w T ord. Adam is said to be created when he was 
formed of pre-existing material — the dust of the earth ; 
and Eve was created when formed from a part of man. 
The term is not confined to a calling into existence of 
something out of nothing. The creation of which we 
speak is not the production of a new existence out of 
nothing, but the reforming or restoration of the human 
soul from a previously disordered or dilapidated con- 
dition. 

In this restoration the re-invigoration of the con- 
science attends the illumination of the intellect. And 



410 Christian Psychology : 

possessed of new life and energy, it reins up the im- 
petuous soul from sins after which it has eagerly run, 
disturbs the soul when sin is contemplated, kindles 
impatience and indignation when the attempt is made 
to seduce the soul from the path of integrity, and 
generally claims to rule and regulate the whole man, as 
a governor newly installed into office. It was in office 
before ; but its diseased and weakened condition resulted 
in a very disordered, negligent, or spasmodic govern- 
ment. If it was bad the other faculties were even worse. 
The understanding was darkened, for the sun had gone 
down, as the records of heathendom may testify, although 
the feeble lamp of reason was burning, and the emotional 
nature was thoroughly perverted by the habitual indul- 
gence of evil affections, and the executive power, the 
will, fairly represented the directive and impulsive 
forces of the soul. But now, with the restoration of 
the conscience to new life and power, comes the illumin- 
ation of the mind and the purification and elevation of 
the emotions. The conscience rules over a renewed 
soul, disposed in every part to respond to the Divine will. 
Absolute health may not at once be enjoyed by any 
part, but the whole soul is convalescent. As the work 
of material creation or restoration was progressive, till 
man, the glory of this lower creation, appeared : so the 
work of spiritual creation or restoration is progressive, 
till the Son of man, the glory of the higher creation, 
appears. The Spirit who began the work carries it on. 
The Sun of righteousness arises upon the soul with 
increasing splendour till the noon-tide glory is reached. 
The strength of the new man steadily advances notwith- 
standing many apparent decays, till the maturity and 
vigour of spiritual manhood are attained. The jarring of 



Its Restoration by Grace. 411 

disorder gradually decreases until the whole machinery 
works with facility and smoothness under the regulating 
power of an enlightened conscience. In this up-building 
of the normal faculty in authority and power the Spirit 
employs, as a main instrument, the inspired word. By 
its application the spiritual magnetism of the conscience 
is constantly increased, or restored when impaired by 
the presence of sin. That holy word not only invigorates 
conscience, but enlightens the understanding and purifies 
the affections, that the rule of conscience may be both 
natural and pleasant. Its constant use, under the 
Divine blessing, heals and brightens the whole soul, 
until the man receives the seal of perfect and eternal 
conformity to the Divine image. 



4 1 2 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XLI. 

THE DIVINE PSYCHOLOGY. 

When the Divine moralist would point out the perfection 
and extent of that duty which man owes to his Maker, 
he uses four distinct terms as descriptive of the human 
soul, over all which the principle of obedience inculcated 
must hold sway. Thus, in replying to the question, — 
"Which is the first commandment of all?" from a 
learned man of more than ordinary religious discernment, 
he said, — "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all 
thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, 
and with all thy strength : this is the first command- 
ment." — Mark xii. 30. What are we to understand by 
these four terms — heart, soul, mind, and strength ? Did 
infinite wisdom, in using them, intend to refer to four 
distinct departments or capacities of the human soul ? — 
or is the language to be understood as simply a full and 
varied form of expressing the whole nature of man with- 
out respect to any distinct capacities or powers ? Or if 
some distinction is allowed as between heart and mind, 
may not the term " soul " be regarded as explanatory, 
and the term " strength " as referring to physical energy 
rather than spiritual capacity ? The principle either of 
explanation or of distinction must be carried throughout. 
If we adopt that of explanation, the three terms which 
follow " heart " must go together as an exposition of the 
first term. If we choose that of distinction, then we 



The Divine Psychology. 413 

regard our Saviour as referring to four distinct capa- 
cities or powers, as spiritual departments, which embrace 
the whole human soul. 

A distinction was early made among the operations of 
the soul. As a necessary result separate terms were 
chosen to express these operations, or the spiritual 
capacities which originated or controlled them. Hence 
the earliest form of this great command, in Deuteronomy 
vi. 5, embraced three separate terms, " heart," "soul," 
and " might." The Seventy, in rendering this verse in 
Greek, seem to have felt that the understanding or mind 
should not be excluded, and have translated the Hebrew 
lebhabh, " heart," by dictvoiot (dianoia) " understanding," 
or mind, and not by xxqliot. (kardia) " heart." It may 
be, that in their judgment dixvoia. had a more expansive 
property than xugduz, and was better fitted to take the 
place of lebhabh, which, beyond question, was used by 
the Hebrews to express the ideas which are conveyed to 
us by the words, conscience, heart, and understanding. 
In two subsequent chapters, Deut. x. 12, xi. 13, the same 
writer connects this command with the two terms, 
"heart" and "soul," the former of which is rendered 
in both cases by the Seventy by xugdioi. It thus appears 
that the ancient Hebrew employed three separate terms, 
and the Greek four, to express the extent of this com- 
mand over the spiritual nature of man. To the one 
term lebhabh the Seventy gave the double interpretation 
liavQioL and xagdia, not regarding these terms as synony- 
mous, for they use the both in one verse (Jere. xxxi. 33, 
Eng. xxxviii. 33, Sep.) in reference to the powers of the 
soul. The propriety of the course adopted need not be 
questioned from the latitude allowed by the Hebrews to 
the word lebhabh. 



414 Christian Psychology : 

We may now consider the terms used by our Lord. 
As he spoke the Hebrew of that age we may suppose 
that he used the terms employed by Moses, with the 
slight alteration of form and accent, and the insertion of 
the fourth term, that for " mind," not used by Moses. 
The words in. order of speech would then be — lebhabh, 
nephesh, binah, m'odh — heart, soul, mind, strength. 
These are the terms employed by Moses in Deut. vi. 5, 
with the addition of binah, " mind." This last term had 
come prominently into use in the days of Solomon, and 
occurs frequently in the book of Proverbs, where it is 
translated "understanding," both as knowledge attained, 
and the faculty by which knowledge is attained. The 
word for strength, m'odh, seems to point to energy, 
might, power to weigh down or bend, and is fairly 
applicable to the firm resolution of the will which presses 
its decision, and desires to bend all to its determinations. 

Regarding then these four terms Lebhabh, Nephesh, 
Binah, and M'odh, as representing four distinct depart- 
ments of the human spirit, what idea would we attach 
to each ? The first we regard as intended by our divine 
Teacher to represent the conscience or normal faculty, 
the second the emotional department, the third the intel- 
lectual capacity, and the fourth the executive department 
or will. 

We believe, after all the mental application that we 
have given to the subject, that it is not possible in strict 
accuracy to resolve any one of these powers into another, 
and that there is no mental exercise which does not 
belong directly or originally to one of these capacities, 
singly or to two or more combined. In other words, 
that there are four, and only four, distinct, original 
departments or spiritual capacities in the creature Man. 



The Divine Psychology. 415 

It is no small satisfaction to find the result of abstruse 
philosophical investigation confirmed by the voice of 
Infinite intelligence. 

But may it not be premature to announce such a con- 
clusion ? There is another language equally inspired 
with the Hebrew, what is its voice on this important 
subject ? Its terms are : " xagfiiot, \pw%»j, Siuvoia, and 
jcr;£U£," (Mark xii. 30). Of xagha (kardia) " heart," we 
have already spoken in a former chapter. It was then 
seen to be a term chosen by inspired writers to express 
the idea of a spiritual faculty which accuses, reproves, 
and condemns — which is the normal faculty, conscience. 
One of the chief meanings assigned to ^jv^yj' (psuche) 
" soul," is the emotional nature of man, the seat of the 
affections or feelings. It corresponds to the Hebrew 
nephesh, which is the term for soul as possessed of 
animation, feeling, desire. The third term diotvoia. 
(dianoia) "mind," has a definite meaning. It is res- 
tricted to intellect or intellectual exercise. It does 
not include either conscience or feeling. The fourth 
term icr^ug (ischus) " strength," is applied to bodily or 
mental strength. The ancient Greeks used the term 
in connection with mental feelings, as when Thucidides 
speaks of the strength of hope, and the sacred 
writers employ it when speaking of the power of purely 
spiritual beings as God and the angels. — Eph. i. 19, 
vi. 10; 2 Pet. ii. 11. It is therefore aptly applied when 
used to express that faculty which is both the exponent 
and the embodiment of the power, might, or energy of 
the human spirit, and which so readily controls the 
physical energy of the man. 

If these distinct capacities or spiritual departments 
exist, there is a propriety and utility in naming them ; if 



41 6 Christian Psychology : 

they do not exist, the naming of them seems both uncalled 
for and improper, as fitted to bewilder. They do exist, 
and therefore they receive distinct recognition from the 
lips of Him who knew what powers the spirit of man 
possessed. The propriety and utility of their distinct 
recognition is readily apprehended. We may direct a 
gardener to water a certain tree. In naming the tree 
we may be understood as embracing all belonging to it. 
But, wishing to be particular, we may say, Water the 
roots and stock ; or, with greater minuteness, Water the 
root, stock, and branches ; or, anxious that the watering 
should be thorough, we may prefer to say — Water the 
root, stock, branches, and leaves. The term "tree" 
includes all, and in certain circumstances might be held 
as sufficient ; but for our purpose we prefer to be minute, 
and distinguish the essential departments. In the same 
way the term " spirit " may include all the attributes of 
the divine Being, or of an angel, or the human intelli- 
gence ; but the special mention of the powers or capaci- 
ties of either may have at times its appropriate interest 
and power. Therefore the command assumed the form 
of — " Thou shalt love the Lord with all thy heart, with 
all thy soul, with all thy mind, and with all thy strength," 
and not simply : Thou shalt love the Lord with thy whole 
spirit. The meaning is — love to God, as thy God, shall 
pervade, overflow, and control at all times, thy con- 
science, emotions, intellect, and will. The order of the 
terms is not of material importance. The soul is one. 
But if distinction of place is allowed, conscience, or the 
normal faculty retains, by right, the first place ; the 
intellect may claim the second ; the emotional nature, 
the third place, as moved by the operations of the intel- 
lect and conscience ; and the will, or executive power, 



TJic Divine Psychology. 417 

the fourth and last place, as called into exercise by con- 
science, the intellect, and the emotional nature, and as 
immediately preceding external action — no other mental 
state necessarily intervening between the decision of the 
spirit and its outward exhibition. 

If our conceptions of the departmental arrangement 
of the human spirit are true to nature, we may expect 
to find traces of this tessarene or four-one order (if we 
may add a new term to our stock of English words) in 
the operations and organizations which had their origin 
with man's Maker, but the management of which has 
been committed to human capacity. Man stamps his 
own image, often unconsciously, on his own operations. 
He frequently delights to do so. He not only calls his 
estate and home and children by his own name, but he 
engraves his image and handwriting on his manufac- 
tures and productions. In ways less visible he leaves 
his impress in his writings, and on the human spirits 
with whom he frequently comes in contact. He seeks 
to mould after his own feelings and notions. His organi- 
zations will partake of his character and capacity. In 
Divine operations and organizations we expect to find 
a certain uniformity in beings of the same order — they 
will have an essential unity. Nature reveals such facts. 
And in organizations committed to creature agency we 
shall find an adaptation to the capacities and powers at 
the disposal of the creature. The world teems with 
illustrations from the lowest forms of animal life up to 
man. To man we must confine our attention. There is 
a body politic and a body ecclesiastic, both founded by 
infinite wisdom, but entrusted for management to human 
capacity. Are there any traces of this tessarene order in 
their organization, and consequent adaptation to sue- 



41 8 Christian Psychology : 

cessful development and control by the creature man ? 
There are striking analogies testifying to a common 
origin, involving a skilful and benevolent adaptation at 
once to the necessities and capacities of the controlling 
agent. 

The State is a political body, a corporate existence 
ordained by God for the guidance, improvement, and 
preservation of society. How is this body moved "and 
regulated ? The answer might be in many dissimilar 
ways. But when we modify the question, and ask how 
does civilised, enlightened, and educated man conduct 
his political organization ? The reply may be, " By an 
approximation to the original design, by a natural pro- 
cess of evolution from his own spiritual nature." In that 
corporate existence the four departments attain a marked 
prominence. 

A head is indispensable. It matters not what name 
he receives — Governor, President, Sovereign, or Em- 
peror. From him the supreme commands go forth. He 
is the object of final appeal. In his name laws are 
promulgated. By his authority rewards are bestowed 
and punishments inflicted. He is the representative of 
the Normal faculty in man. 

A legislative department was found indispensable. 
The head needed light and information. One or two 
assemblies meet, and deliberate for the making, revising, 
or altering of statutes which may become laws when they 
receive the consent of the head of authority. In this 
department of combined wisdom, counsel, and informa- 
tion, we see the evolution and counterpart of man's 
Intellectual capacity. 

The people are the great source of power. They move 
and are moved by the Legislative assemblies. When 



The Divine Psychology. 419 

they are strongly excited, legislation may be expedited or 
impeded in a great degree. They are the fountain of 
action in many important measures. Though not the 
governing authority, their influence is powerfully felt 
both in initiating and in modifying governmental proceed- 
ings. Distinguished as the ruled from the rulers, they 
are an essential part of the corporate existence, the 
spring and support of action and power in every great 
enterprise. In them the Emotional nature of man 
obtains a striking resemblance. 

An executive is needed. Neither the governor nor the 
legislature, nor the people, can undertake this work. It 
pertains to a class of officers. It is theirs to carry into 
execution conclusions reached by the agreement of the 
other three. They are clothed with authority, but they 
are not the fountains of authority. They are its expo- 
nents. Behind them are the law-makers, and the head 
of influence in whose name they act. The whole 
machinery of government is manipulated by them. It 
is theirs to keep in working order all its parts. In this 
the counterpart of the human Will is clearly apprehended. 
The will carries out the pleasure of the emotions, the 
intellect, or the conscience, or the choice or conclusion 
of any two of them, or the judgment of the three com- 
bined. Harmony is secured when the will is the expres- 
sion of the three. So does the executive of a country 
work with general satisfaction when they carry out what 
are not the demands of one department in opposition to 
the others, but the wishes of the people, the legislature, 
and the sovereign. 

The Church is an ecclesiastical body, a corporate 
existence organised for a special purpose by the supreme 
Ruler. That purpose is his own glory, and the restora- 



420 Christian Psychology : 

tion and salvation of men. In this organization the four 
departments have their appropriate place. 

There is a Head, the fountain of law and order, the 
bestower of rewards and punishments, the person of 
ultimate appeal, and the supreme Arbiter. What the 
normal faculty is to the spirit of man, and much more, 
Christ is to his church, as its sole and supreme Head. 

There is a legislative department in the complete 
record of the Divine will. In its construction man has 
performed his part. The legislators were human, and 
yet their laws are inspired, as they were chosen of God, 
and guided by His counsel. Their human peculiarities 
are, however, apparent in all portions of the Record. 
The laws are Divine in origin and substance, but they 
bear the traces of the human spirits through which they 
have passed. Ecclesiastical legislation is now limited 
to the interpretation of Divine laws, and to the rectifi- 
cation of human conduct according to these laws. Such 
is the counterpart of man's intellectual directory, the 
fountain of information, intelligence, and counsel. 

The body of believers have also their potent influence. 
To them belongs the right, as to the people in the body 
politic, of electing their own officers and representatives. 
They move by petitions the legislative assembly and 
the governing Head. They impel their officers to action, 
and prevail by the vehemence of their desires with the 
avenging Judge. As they are possessed by courage and 
hope, the church prevails. When filled with peace and 
joy, prosperity marks the condition of the ecclesiastical 
body. If they are strong, it is strong ; if they are feeble 
and faltering, its movements are languid as the actions 
of a man devoid of feeling. Here is the representative 
of man's emotional susceptibility. As the emotional 



The Divine Psychology. 421 

nature of a man gives tone and character to his whole 
conduct so the majority of believers in a church stamp 
the character and operations of that church. 

The Church has also her earthly executive. These 
are rulers chosen by the people, but sanctioned by the 
sovereign. To him the} 7 vow fidelity and allegiance 
while promoting at once the sovereign's honour and the 
people's welfare. Christ calls some to bear rule in His 
house. To them he gives authority, and commands the 
people to obey them while carrying out his laws. They 
are not, however, to be lords over God's heritage, nor 
to assume titles, or claim homage unauthorised by their 
king. When they exceed their powers they deserve to 
be disregarded, and the body of believers may make 
choice of others who will strictly adhere to the sove- 
reign's will and the people's rights. This is the corporate 
will that corresponds to the individual will. As the 
latter is often swayed by false notions, by some feeling 
or passion, and not by an enlightened conscience, so 
may the executive of church or state turn aside from 
the path of natural order, the united impulse of authority, 
wisdom, and right feeling, and obey the dictation of 
error and caprice. 

To some these analogues may appear obscure, if not 
strained. Let such exercise the patience of the inquisi- 
tive and penetrating, and they will discover wonderful 
lines of order and symmetry pervading the works of 
God. The works of God are the mirror of his character. 
When they are intelligent creatures bearing his image, 
it may be expected that their productions will bear their 
image, by a law apparently co-extensive with creation. 
The analogue is what might be anticipated. If these 
four departments or capacities were deemed requisite 



422 Christian Psychology : 

for the right government and employment of the indivi- 
dual existence, the creation of God, is it not reasonable 
that something corresponding to them should be deemed 
requisite for the right government and employment of 
the corporate existence of state and church, founded by 
God but managed by man ? The analogue is apparent 
to the intelligent investigator. There are analogies of 
a higher nature which open to our vision, but this is not 
the place to attempt their exploration. 

Over this spirit of tessarene endowments the principle 
of love, by divine command, must hold perfect sway. 
What is love ? It is delight in and attachment to some 
object. The object of love embraced by this command 
is the great God. He, the alone self-existent and all- 
sustaining, is the very centre and glory of all excellence, 
and is therefore most fitted to call forth and sustain for 
ever this powerful feeling. It is moreover as our God, 
that we are to love Him. A special relationship to or 
property in him, as the sum of all our possessions is to 
engage our heart, and rivet our affections. Love is 
happiness. The command to exercise it is a command 
to secure the purest bliss of which the creature can be 
capable. And to exercise it on One unchangeably 
glorious is to secure happiness as enduring as the 
existence allotted to the creature. This love is to rule and 
control the whole man. It is to clothe the soul as with 
a garment ; it is to animate it as a spirit ; it is to pervade 
it as the pure, health-imparting and glowing life current. 
Under such an influence the normal faculty points 
steadily heavenward, detects and corrects the slightest 
deviation from the centre of attraction, and draws the 
soul upward to its natural resting-place. The intellect is 
prompted to seek out the excellencies and fulness of this 



The Divine Psychology. 423 

great Being, and combining them or presenting them 
singly, to engage the admiration of the soul, and with 
that its perfect satisfaction in its supreme portion. The 
emotional nature is absorbed by this most potent emo- 
tion. Its evil propensities are subdued, and all its 
benevolent and agreeable feelings fostered and developed. 
Love sits upon the throne of this department as her 
peculiar seat, and holds in her hands the reins of human 
potency. Over every faculty prompted by emotion, her 
benign sway extends. The will, the last to yield, bows 
meekly to this heavenly power. Long controlled by 
pride and selfishness in direct antagonism to the very 
nature of divine love, it required the powerful glow of 
celestial benevolence to reverse the whole current of the 
soul. But it is reversed. And now the last to yield 
assumes a prominence, and bends the whole powers of 
the soul to obedience to the master emotion. The 
executive capacity reveals its claim to be regarded as a 
distinct power by grasping, binding, and regulating all 
under its power in entire subservience to what is not 
only the dominant feeling of the soul, but its animating 
and guiding principle. The man is free, as any creature 
can be ; but he is also bound by the silken cords of the 
most ennobling and enduring passion ; in the atmosphere 
of which the rational creature lives and breathes most 
freely ; and in which it attains its highest development 
and bliss. For this perfection let us all ardently aspire. 



424 Christian Psychology : 



DEPARTMENT V. 



HABITUDES. 
CHAPTER XLII. 

INTELLECTUAL HABITUDES. 

I. CLEARNESS OF APPREHENSION. 2. QUICKNESS IN CAL- 
CULATION. 3. READINESS IN COMPOSITION. 4. 

ACUTENESS IN DISTINCTION. 5. COMPREHENSIVE- 
NESS IN GRASP. 6. PROMPTNESS IN JUDGMENT. 

With our last chapter terminated our survey of the 
natural endowments of the human spirit. But no sys- 
tem of psychology can be considered complete which 
does not take cognizance of certain acquired states of 
mind or spirit. These acquired states we have chosen 
to designate Habitudes. They are often, in the expres- 
sive terms in common use, " a second nature." Acquir- 
ing such prominence and importance they claim our 
attention. Some are the result of the exercise and de- 
velopment, in an excessive measure, of some one faculty 
or power ; others are the effect of the exercise, in a 
special manner, of two or more faculties. To ordinary 
observers this acquired power may appear original ; 
and the habitude which is the fruit of the exercise of 
two or more distinct original powers may assume, in the 
estimation of such, the place of a separate original 



Intellectual Habitudes. 425 

faculty. Hence the propriety of this brief investigation 
of our mental habitudes. Apart from the philosophical 
or theoretical, the consideration of these mental habi- 
tudes is of great practical importance. 

Following the natural order of man's endowments, 
we are led to consider first — the Intellectual habitudes. 
In general, it may be affirmed that the steady and con- 
tinuous exercise of any faculty will result in a facility in 
use, and an expansion of power. But the exercise must 
not be too severe or protracted, else the very opposite 
results will follow. The faculty will become slow in 
movement and feeble in power. So far as we can judge 
man does not come into being with matured mental 
powers, the material organs, through which the spirit 
operates, being also immature. We regard the faculties 
of the infant spirit as complete in number, but imma- 
ture and undeveloped. They are like the opening bud, 
the beauty, fragrance, and utility are yet to appear. 
The development of the spirit's energies, though closely 
connected with the development of the material frame 
through which it works, is independent of it in a great 
measure. In a body stationary in height and expansion, 
the mind may continue to display great expansion of 
powers. After the brain had apparently reached ma- 
turity, the race of intellectual renown with many had 
only begun. In some cases children display an early 
intellectual development with very little corresponding 
bodily development ; in other cases both expand to- 
gether ; in all, mental expansion is expected with an 
increase of age, whatever progress the body may attain. 
It is clear that cultivation expands the intellectual 
powers, so that what was at one time beyond compre- 

DD 



426 Christian Psychology : 

hension becomes readily apprehended by the matured 
or trained intellect. 

This leads us to notice Intuitions. By some writers 
much has been made of intuitions. The intellectual 
capacity has been restricted in a large measure to 
intuitive work. This is the folly of rushing to extremes. 
Some would represent man as born with the germs of 
all manner of ideas in his infant spirit ; others, leaning 
to the school of materialists, regard him as wholly 
dependent on the development of matter for intellectual 
progress — as born not only without ideas, but without 
high spiritual capacities independent of place and matter. 
The truth lies here. Man is born without ideas, notions, 
or conceptions, but with the germs of high spiritual and 
eternal capacities, intellectual, emotional, executive, and 
moral. By these germs we mean mental or spirit powers 
in embryo, waiting for expansion or development, as 
time and circumstances will allow. In ordinary circum- 
stances this mental development corresponds with the 
growth of the body and the increase of time up to a 
certain and indefinite period ; but we are led to believe 
that mental maturity may be attained not only without 
the ordinary maturity of the body, but apart from the 
body altogether. We do not suppose that infant spirits 
which leave our earth remain through eternity in an 
immature state, or with undeveloped powers. If there 
is expansion of a high class awaiting the earth-matured 
spirit in the celestial regions, reason would say that that 
heavenly world, with all its facilities for the enjoyment 
of life, cannot be unfit for the expansion of the faculties 
of infant spirits of earth ? But what are intuitions ? 
— They are simply intellectual apprehensions. We do 



Intellectual Habitudes. 427 

not regard it as appropriate to speak of the decisions or 
impulses of the normal faculty as intuitions. We would 
confine the term to the intellect. But to what class of 
apprehensions do intuitions belong ? — To that which 
embraces fundamental truths. When the mind appre- 
hends or conceives a fundamental truth, one beyond 
which human penetration cannot go, that apprehension 
or conception, or intellectual cognition, is called an 
intuition. On such simple, unprovable apprehensions, 
knowledge is built up. In the very nature of things, 
and according to the faculty for acquiring knowledge 
given to us, we perceive that certain things are true with- 
out any process of proof, and as not calling for any such 
process, as that a whole made up of several parts is 
greater than any one part of it, — that two straight 
lines parallel to each other extended ever so far can 
never meet, or that the two sides of a triangle must be 
greater than the third. In one direction the plummet 
of the human intellect soon reaches the bottom ; in 
another the spirit soars on the wings of immensity, or 
sails in the ocean of space, without finding limit or shore. 
What is Space, and what is Time ? Men have 
racked their brains to answer these simple questions. 
The one may fairly be defined the region occupied by 
the material creation of God ; the other, the period 
allotted for the existence of the human race on earth. 
The obscurity raised about these terms is equalled only 
by the dense mists which are made to surround the 
terms — " infinite " and " absolute." When men lose 
themselves in the fogs of their own creating, it is no 
wonder if men of common^ sense refuse to follow them ; 
and it cannot be a matter of surprise if the speculations 
of such learned men cease to have any value in the eyes 



428 Christian Psychology : 

of the great bulk of humanity. The application of the 
terms "infinite" and "absolute," to the Almighty, must 
ever be with a limitation of meaning. The action of 
the Almighty is limited to what is consistent with his 
character, as the just, and the true, and the good ; its 
infinitude is in everything great and holy, and wise and 
good. And from the moment of creation, his relation 
to what is external to Himself begins, and the " abso- 
lute " receives its needed modification. Up to this 
point human apprehension can soar ; beyond it lies 
the limitless domain of imagination. 

It is very doubtful if mental science has gained any- 
thing by the introduction of such terms as " intuition" 
and " cognition " for perception and apprehension. It 
is well to improve the nomenclature of the science ; but 
is not intuition a perception ? and is not cognition an 
apprehension ? There are fundamental truths — let us 
adhere to them. With the term " intuition " an idea of 
individual capacity is associated, and we all know how 
varied individual capacities are. What may be intuitive 
to one may be far from intuitive to another. Hence 
the impossibility of enumerating intuitions. There are 
self-evident truths ; but some are apprehensible as such 
only by highly-cultivated minds. What are intuitions 
to one are not to another, for the capacity of one is often 
greatly superior to that of another. As the intellect is 
cultivated man's apprehension becomes clearer and 
stronger, and his field of intuition becomes enlarged. It 
is undesirable to be for ever shifting the foundation 
stones of a science. It is time that psychology received 
a permanent basis, on which a perfect superstructure 
might gradually be reared. 

The following are ordinary Intellectual Habitudes : — 



Intellectual Habitudes. 429 

1. Clearness of Apprehension. — The intellect is 
improved by what may be called sharpening and bur- 
nishing. Without cultivation or training it is blunt or 
dimmed, even where there is superior natural power. 
When sharpened by exercise and furnished with informa- 
tion, it is able by a glance to apprehend what before was 
incomprehensible. Reaching this stage, by very moder- 
ate attention it retains its clearness of perception. That 
attention, however, includes a careful regard to the laws 
of health. A cool head, with a supply of pure blood to 
the brain, will greatly facilitate intellectual exercises of 
all kinds, and especially clear conceptions of intricate 
subjects. This state is generally reached by the mature 
intellect, and is frequently witnessed when men are 
dealing with subjects to which they have given particular 
attention, as a skilled financier with the revenue of a 
country, or an experienced merchant with the laws of 
trade, a linguist with the particular language which he 
has made a subject of profound study, or a philosopher 
with his favourite science. In such cases there is a 
double result ; the intellect is whetted and the mind is 
supplied with information of a particular kind. On 
other subjects there may be a lack of intelligence ; but 
the capacity for readily acquiring any knowledge has been 
improved. Hence the marked difference in compre- 
hending a subject between the educated and the unedu- 
cated. The vision of the one is sharp ; the other must 
be operated upon, or furnished with magnifying glasses, 
that he may see. In natural capacity the latter may be 
equal to the former ; but the former has reached, by 
means of training, an intellectual state or habitude not 
attained by the latter. 



430 Christian Psychology: 

2. Quickness in Calculation. — This is readily per- 
ceived in the experienced accountant and in the school- 
boy drilled in mental arithmetic. Three mental facul- 
ties are called into play — apprehension, construction, 
and retrospection or memory. Facility is acquired in 
the exercise of each of these powers. By apprehension 
the accountant seizes the subject and keeps it before the 
mind ; by construction he builds on the foundation, 
taking down or putting up materials as may be required ; 
and by retrospection he looks back for each point 
required, that it may come forward in its own place and 
contribute to the desired result. Great aptness in this 
exercise is the result of many repeated efforts. It cor- 
responds in some measure to the mechanical art of 
type-setting. How slowly are the types taken up one 
by one and examined by the lad who for the first time 
stands before a case to learn the art of the compositor. 
But see the same lad some years hence. He can 
seize the types with a rapidity and an accuracy sur- 
prising to the untaught observer. The school-boy, by 
drilling in the class of mental arithmetic, has got certain 
faculties into easy working order ; they come at call, 
and move with a swiftness astonishing even to himself. 
The clerk who stands behind the counter is ashamed 
to be seen hesitating as to the cost of a variety of common 
articles purchased by a customer. He must acquire the 
art of quick calculation or suffer disgrace. This acquire- 
ment, so important in all the details of trade, is attained 
by ordinary intellects without any uncommon effort. 

3. Readiness in composition, or fluency in speak- 
ing and writing. — To many this is a difficult attainment. 
Nor should it occasion surprise. Four or five distinct 



Intellectual Habitudes. 431 

intellectual powers have to be called into operation. 
These are application, penetration, construction, retro- 
spection, and deduction. Without application there is 
no laying hold on the subject. Without penetration its 
meaning is not reached. To gather up and arrange the 
ideas and language is the work of construction. For its 
aid retrospection must ever be in service. And deduc- 
tion is the right hand help of construction. The 
executive power is the will, but the prominent intellec- 
tual faculty is construction, in setting forth by speech or 
writing the ideas, conceptions, or deductions gathered 
up or attained by the exercise of various powers. The 
difficulty is mainly attributable to the number of facul- 
ties demanded for this exercise. It is much easier to 
control and drive one or two ordinary horses than five 
or six. The music which has the widest range and 
highest combination of notes is ever more difficult than 
the ordinary range of single notes. When we increase 
the keys of an accordeon we add to the difficulty of the 
performer. But the readiness of composition is attain- 
able. The man who, on a first attempt at public speak- 
ing, could only stutter out a few words, and these bor- 
rowed, before his tongue became motionless, has become 
an accomplished orator, capable of arresting the atten- 
tion of a multitude, and pouring forth torrents of well- 
arranged sentences, charged with sound arguments and 
glowing thoughts. And the man who could not put 
together in many days, without the greatest difficulty, 
a few pages of manuscript, acquires the skill and apti- 
tude of composition to such an extent that the produc- 
tion of a volume of light literature is to him a pleasant 
pastime. It is said that deep thought is opposed to 
fluency of speech or writing. It is not always so. For, 



432 Christian Psychology : 

like our quartz veins, the gold is generally more abun- 
dant the farther down we go, and those who get down- 
in thought, provided they do not lose themselves in a 
labyrinth, have frequently an inexhaustible supply of 
ideas. Obscure writing sometimes passes for great 
depth of thought, while clear writing, of great penetra- 
tion and grasp, is deemed by the unreflecting shallow 
and ordinary. Like other habitudes, this facility may 
be lost, in some measure, by disuse. It is, however, 
speedily regained, if a marked prominence had formerly 
been secured. Exercise is indispensable to fluency, and 
great care to accuracy. 

4. Acuteness in Distinctions. — This important habi- 
tude is the result of the diligent exercise of two intellectual 
faculties — penetration and distinction. Its grand arena 
is the field of controversy, specially the law courts. No 
one can question the prominent intellectual state of the 
accomplished lawyer. Whatever difficulties may attend 
the collection of information and its skilful arrangement, 
the art of acute distinction is an attainment within the 
reach of most. The finer distinctions may indeed belong 
to a select class of minds, but ordinary acuteness is 
easily acquired. Uncultivated minds often show an 
aptness in making distinctions, when but partially ac- 
quainted with controversy. In this, as in other qualities, 
much must depend on the original mental endowment. 
Beyond question some are endowed with powers of 
penetration and analysis not possessed by others. To 
such the attainment of which we speak is easy. Acute- 
ness is valuable in preventing deception and escaping 
from the entanglements of error. Yet some are impeded 
in action by the very sharpness of their wit. To coun- 
teract the undue exercise of this habit, another power 



Intellectual Habitudes. 433 

must be called into play. We must learn to generalize 
as well as analyse. After using the microscope, it is well 
to employ for a brief period the telescope. We shall then 
remember that there is a world beyond the minute points 
to which our attention has been so ardently directed. 
Discussion and controversy, with the perusal of logical 
writings, are the best means for the attainment of acute- 
ness. In the conflict of minds, the intellectual weapons 
are not only burnished, but sharpened. If the hospital 
is one of the best schools for the medical student, the 
debating club is one of the best stepping-stones to the 
law courts. 

5. Comprehensiveness of Grasp. — It is interesting 
to mark how the mind of man, when possessed of 
decided capacity, rises to the necessities of an extensive 
command. When young, the play-ground exercised all 
his ingenuity ; and' now, when grey-haired, he rules an 
empire. There were many stepping-stones. What would 
have overpowered him at one time by its very com- 
plicity, falls into order before him, at the touch of 
enlarged experience. He controls a household, then a 
municipality, then a province, and then a kingdom. He 
directs the movements of a company, then of a bat- 
talion, then of a regiment, then of a brigade, and lastly 
of an army. He who once paddled his own canoe on the 
banks of his native river, commands successively the 
schooner, the barque, the corvette, and the monster 
ironclad. The mind has expanded with the demands 
made upon it, until it embraces in its grasp the high and 
the low, the minute and the widely-extended, and is at 
home in directing the one as in detailing the duties of 
the other. It is admitted that all men are not endowed 
with this capacity. It pertains to a decided minority. 



434 Christian Psychology : 

Few are called to occupy the high places of field or 
cabinet. And even these few obtain their ruling 
capacity by stages of experience. Here, too, develop- 
ment is varied in time. One man is as fit to take com- 
mand of an army or an empire, at forty, as another at 
sixty years of age. The attainment is only reached by 
the active exercise, within progressive limits, of almost 
every intellectual power. Apprehension, in its widest 
form of comprehension, application, construction, distri- 
bution, deduction, and retention, have, with others, to 
occupy a prominent place. Decided superiority of 
intellect is therefore indispensable to the efficient and 
successful command of an extensive and diversified 
charge. And to the natural ability must be added the 
habitude of grasp and management, only secured by 
proper and progressive experience. The capacity is in 
an essential degree a growth, the result of cultivation of 
a peculiar kind in a special field. 

6. Promptness in Judgment. — One who has fre- 
quently attended a magistrate's court, on the bench of 
which sat an experienced judge of human conduct, will 
have witnessed on many occasions a promptness in 
deciding on the merits of a case fitted to produce 
astonishment if not doubt. Before an ordinary observer 
begins to make up his mind on the preponderance of 
evidence on one side, the decision is announced. Not 
only is the law open before the judge, detailing the 
requirements of the case in respect to duty, or the 
penalty for the disregard of the laws, but his experience 
has put him quickly in possession of the key to the prob- 
lem, the design of the action, or the real defaulter in the 
case. He is not infallible, but his extensive knowledge 
of human nature in many similar circumstances, and his 



Intellectual Habitudes. 435 

perfect acquaintance with the law which he has to 
administer leaves little room for doubt what the decision 
must be, if truth and justice are to guide his conduct. 
His mind is trained to grasp with ease the salient points 
of the case submitted, and he quickly deduces the legiti- 
mate conclusion from established premises. He reaches 
in a few minutes what the inexperienced could not grasp 
for hours. By a similar acquirement the experienced sea 
captain, when suddenly overtaken by a tempest, amid 
many things demanding instant attention, decides on 
what must first be done, that all others may follow in 
natural order, without a moment's delay. Great judg- 
ment, with equal promptness, are at times demanded 
from those who have charge of ships amidst the uncer- 
tainties of dangerous seas or stormy winds. See also the 
able physician, when suddenly called to attend a man 
severely injured. Experience he has ; but every case has 
its peculiarity ; and here it is that his judgment has 
scope. Instant decision is demanded. The proper 
remedy brings life to the wounded man; a mistake in 
choice of applications results in certain death. Clear 
apprehension, keen distinction, and prompt deduction are 
called into exercise. Their diligent cultivation under a 
variety of circumstances produces the specified attain- 
ment. 

Such are the ordinary habitudes which result from the 
continuous exercise and healthy development of certain 
intellectual faculties. 



43 6 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XLIII. 

EMOTIONAL HABITUDES. 

Division I. — From Single Emotions. 

I, PIETY. 2. SELF-SUSTENANCE. 3. PATRIOTISM. 4. 

BENEVOLENCE. 5. HAPPINESS. 6. CONFIDENCE.— 

7. THANKFULNESS. — 8. HAUGHTINESS. 9. COMPASSION. 

10. ENTHUSIASM. — II. CURIOSITY. 12. COVETOUS- 

NESS. 13. TIMIDITY. 14. MODESTY. 15. IRRITA- 
BILITY. — 16. SADNESS. 

From the fountain of man's emotional nature channels 
are easily formed. That fountain stands generally brim- 
full, seldom below that level, and often overflowing. The 
size of the channel is proportioned to the volume of 
feeling made to run through it. It expands and deepens 
as emotional power finds an easy and continuous outlet. 
These channels are Emotional Habitudes. The illustra- 
tion is necessarily imperfect. The spirit is not matter 
in which a channel may be dug. It is a substance imma- 
terial and pre-eminently elastic. But it is capable of 
receiving and retaining for eternity a bias in one direction 
or another. In the rightly-ordered nature each proper 
emotion has its outlet, and is not allowed to displace 
another or deprive it of its appropriate influence. But the 
nature being one, emotions that are not antagonistic, or 
mutually destructive, often contribute of their strength to 
some particular emotion that has been called into exercise. 
This particular emotion frequently exercised forms a 



Emotional Habitudes. 437 

habitude, and that state or condition takes the name from 
the prominent or prevailing emotion. In other cases 
the habitude is the result of the exercise of two or more 
emotions in almost equal prominence, and cannot 
assume the name of one to the exclusion of the other. 
As these habitudes are interwoven with the employ- 
ments of life, they deserve a brief enumeration. The 
elucidation of each emotion in its proper place in the 
second Department of this work, renders it unnecessary 
here to do more than state the essential features of 
each case. 

We will first notice the Habitudes which have their 
origin in the special exercise and development of one 
prominent emotion ; and then those which are the result 
of the combination of two or more emotions. 

Of the first class each of the following emotions is the 
parent of one or more Habitudes, viz. : — Love, Joy, 
Hope, Gratitude, Pride, Sympathy, Zeal, Wonder, 
Desire, Fear, Shame, Anger, and Grief. In the forma- 
tion of the second class, Desire and Zeal, Hope and Fear, 
Pride and Envy, Hatred and Anger, Joy and Hope, 
combine their powers. 

From the noble emotion of Love, in its different out- 
goings, we have not less than four important Habitudes. 

1. Piety. — This habitude claims the first place. It is 
devotion to the honour and service of God. It has its 
root, in love to God. According to the strength and 
extent of the root is the height and expansion of the tree. 
Piety expands as love to God grows and extends. Other 
elements are combined, as the emotions of wonder, grati- 
tude, and fear, in some of their manifestations ; but love 
is the presiding and constraining power. Other faculties 
of the soul, as the intellect, conscience, and will, take their 



43 8 Christian Psychology : 

part in the duties of piety; but this master-feeling of 
delight in, and as its consequence cleaving to, an object, 
ever inspiring and ever refreshing the soul in action for 
the one beloved, leads all the others captive, and moulds 
the soul for itself. God is Love. He that dwells in 
love dwells in God, and God in him. Let this stream 
overflow for ever. 

2. Self-sustenance. — This is the product of self- 
love. It is seen strongly developed in the love of life, 
and in the consequent efforts to preserve and sustain 
life. It might appear to some that the love of life is 
rather an instinct of the soul, as the desire for food is an 
instinct or appetite of the body. There is a quick appre- 
hension of danger, producing an almost instinctive dread 
of injury or death, which contributes to self-sustinence or 
the preservation of life ; but may it not be found that 
below this lies love of self prompting to activity, 
vigilance, and care ? Some speak of self-love as if it 
were a fault; but the command, "Thou shalt love thy 
neighbour as thyself," proceeds on the very foundation 
of the existence of such a self-love. We are to love our- 
selves. Nature teaches us to do so. But it must be 
within proper limits. When it exceeds these, it becomes 
selfishness, one of the worst and most repulsive traits of 
fallen nature. Self-sustinence is the proper fruit of self- 
love. Within its ample domain the man will take care of 
soul and body, of life, character, and property. 

3. Patriotism. — This is absorbing attention to, and 
concern for, the honour, safety, and welfare of one's 
country. It springs from love of country. Unless the 
inhabitants of a country have treated a native coldly, 
unjustly, or cruelly, there is found implanted in his 
breast an attachment to the land that gave him birth 



Emotional Habitudes. 439 

which is not felt for any other. As time wears on, and 
his hold on another land which he has made his home 
deepens, the place of his birth may sink in his interest or 
concern, and the new home become the country loved ; 
but there is ever felt a peculiar tie to the spot which gave 
him first the breath of life which no other land can 
claim. This is universally recognised. Men expect that 
a man will befriend the place of his birth, if he can, after 
he has become the citizen of another country. This is 
wisely ordered. It contributes to the safety and pros- 
perity of a country. We are attached to the spot which 
we call home, which affords us shelter and comforts, 
and from whose soil we draw our necessary support. 
Patriotism is considered superior to self-love. Hence the 
phrase in time of war — Dulce pro patria mori. If neces- 
sary, life is sacrificed for the defence of country. This is 
the greatest sacrifice which man can make, and when 
voluntarily made, it proves the strength of this habjitude. 
We do not suppose that all who die in defence of their 
country are so moved. A great variety of influences lead 
to the post of danger on the battle-field, and impel to the 
deadly struggle in which life is lost. But patriotism holds 
its place in noble souls ; and men that could shirk danger 
and death will not do so, when the honour of their country 
demands the exposure. A high type of patriotism 
is exhibited in promoting the moral and material 
prosperity of a country, and in keeping her honourably 
out of war, as well as in defending her rights by the 
sword. 

4. Benevolence. — This habitude consists in an 
abiding kindness and good will to man as a fellow 
creature. It results from obeying the command, " Thou 



440 Christian Psychology : 

shall love thy neighbour as thyself." In some circum- 
stances sympathy may contribute to strengthen this 
trait of character, but not always. A man may cherish 
a feeling of benevolence towards those with whose con- 
dition, conduct, and character he can have no sympathy. 
Moved by kindness or love to man, he rejoices in his 
prosperity, and aids him in his adversity. He will go 
out of his way to afford help, and risk his life in 
endeavours to save. Some touching illustrations come 
to us from time to time from life on the ocean. One ship 
has stood by another in great distress, through a dark 
and stormy night, and when it was impossible to keep 
the one afloat till daylight, every possible risk was 
generously encountered in the storm and darkness, 
to save the lives of the perishing. And when the dis- 
mantled ship and her starving crew have been overtaken, 
how readily has food and clothing been shared with 
the destitute ? In such cases sympathy swells the 
stream of benevolence. But there are enemies, criminals, 
and victims of vile indulgence, which claim our benevo- 
lence when they cannot claim our sympathy. If this 
display of love has had scope in the formation of our 
character, we will be prompted to do good to all the 
race, and injury to none. Benevolence is next to piety, 
the noblest trait of humanity. Let it prevail, and crime 
disappears, and wars cease. The cultivation of benevo- 
lence as tke development of an agreeable emotion 
gladdens the heart, checks the growth of improper 
feelings, and sheds over the life a benign and attractive 
influence. A benevolent man commands our respect. 
Even the selfish are ashamed to do him injury. His 
character makes way for him. 



Emotional Habitudes. 441 

From the cultivation of the emotion of Joy comes, — 

5. Happiness. — This agreeable state requires little 
elucidation. To be understood it must be felt. The 
man is happy in whom the emotion of joy is ever welling 
up and overflowing, leaving a deep impress on the soul 
to mark its prevalence and power. Very varied may be 
the source of the joy. The exuberance of health, the 
favouring tide of worldly prosperity, the comfort of 
domestic relations, the high esteem of fellow mortals, 
above all a soul at peace with God, and filled with the 
presence of that Spirit who is the fountain of bliss to all 
creation, may cause the outflow of this desirable feeling. 
Let joy flow in a steady stream from day to day and 
happiness becomes enstamped as a feature of the soul, 
in which the very countenance will participate. To be 
pure it must have its foundation in moral excellence, and 
to be lasting it must have its chosen source in God. 
The happiness which results from unlawful pleasure or 
dishonest gains, or the applause of the wicked, is worth- 
less and shortlived. No earthly cistern can afford either 
a soul-satisfying or an everlasting supply of joy. The 
fountain head is the throne of grace. To it the poorest 
and the humblest of our race have as free access as the 
richest and the highest. Why is man not happy ? — Sin, 
the disturbing element, is within him. 

From the agreeable emotion, Hope, comes, — 

6. Confidence. — It may be said that this important 
Habitude is the result of faith, not of hope. There are 
many acts of the human soul in which several powers 
co-operate. And there are terms in our language which 
express the exercise of two rather than one faculty. Of 
faith it may be said that it is an exercise of the soul, in 
which both the intellect and emotional nature have a part. 

EE 



44 2 Christian Psychology : 

The intellect perceives the qualities which inspire hope ; 
but we may not say that this bare perception of revealed 
excellencies, or of important and beneficial relations is 
faith ; faith is something in advance of intellectual per- 
ception ; it is the confiding or resting of the soul on the 
one in whom reliable qualities have been apprehended. 
Confidence is, therefore, not the result of faith, but faith 
itself; and that faith or confidence is the direct fruit or 
result of hope, and the indirect result of the perception 
of excellent and reliable qualities. Thus by psychological 
investigation we find ourselves unexpectedly landed in 
the definition of faith given by the learned apostle Paul. 
With him faith is the substance of things hoped for, and 
the evidence of things not seen. Considerable con- 
fusion of ideas is the result of applying the term faith 
to the intellectual perception of qualities fitted to inspire 
hope, and also to the result of the exercise of hope. 
What precedes and what follows hope has been called 
faith. Hence it appears at one time as the root, and at 
another as the fruit of hope. There is what is called 
faith which stops short of hope, as the faith of the 
multitude in Jesus, John ii. 23. And there is what is 
called faith which saves the soul, for it is a confidence in 
Christ, the result of hoping in his mercy. The substan- 
tial is distinguished from the visionary, the visible proof 
from the invisible things. The apostle says, faith is in a 
sense, the substance, the present realization of the things 
hoped for, the visible proof or present conviction of 
things unseen. It is clear that with the apostle faith or 
confidence is the result of an antecedent hope. Hope 
is the stretching out of the arms of the soul after some 
desired object on which it fastens a claim by exhibition, 
offer, or promise. When the expectation is strong, the 



Emotional Habitudes. 443 

confidence reposed is equally strong. They act and 
react, supporting each other. Thus a man may say, I 
confide in my physician, for he has raised my hopes of 
recovery by showing me the proofs of his success in cases 
similar to mine. With equal propriety could he say, I 
hope for a recovery for I confide in my physician. When 
goods are given on credit, faith is exercised in the 
integrity of the purchaser, and hope of payment is 
raised. On hopes such as this the merchant rests or 
confides that when his day of payment arrives he may 
have what will meet all demands. Here confidence, 
rest, peace of mind, have as their foundation what are 
considered w r ell-founded hopes. It may be said that 
confidence rests on the promises of payment. That is 
true, but the promises have awakened hopes, and by them 
confidence is upheld. If the promise of payment is the 
foundation, the hopes produced are the pillars, and con- 
fidence is the roof resting on these pillars. Take away 
all hope, and where is confidence ? It ceases. While 
hope covers the head as with a helmet, it is held erect ; 
for confidence has stamped an impress on the heart. 
Confidence may become fool-hardiness from the indul- 
gence of vain hopes ; but even then it reveals the power 
of hope ; the mistake lies in a wrong apprehension 
of the capacity or veracity of what has originated 
hope. The indulgence or development of hope on a 
wrong foundation produces a confidence that ends in 
disappointment or ruin ; while confidence, the product 
of well-founded hopes, gives steadiness and strength in 
the discharge of duty which meet in due time the full 
realization of reward. To the Christian it may well be 
said — Cast not away, then, your confidence, which hath 
great recompense of reward, for the hopes which you 



444 Christian Psychology : 

cherish will never end in shame, because the love God 
is shed abroad in your heart by the Holy Ghost. 

From the emotion of Gratitude, we have the Habi- 
tude of — 

7. Thankfulness. — This state of soul or stamp of 
character is most commendable. It is not very com- 
mon. Men are more prone to look at their wants, than 
to consider their many and great mercies. All have 
cause for thankfulness who are in the receipt of daily 
blessings undeserved. When gratitude is fostered by 
habitual contemplation of the kindness of God, and by 
a repeated summing up of mercies and favours, not only 
is an agreeable emotion strengthened, but a state of 
mind is gradually formed, a habitude produced which 
ennobles the soul and enhances all the comforts of life. 

From Pride is matured the Habitude of — 

8. Haughtiness. — It is an inflated self-esteem, in- 
jurious to its possessor and offensive to others. It is a 
display of pride which seldom fails in evoking pride, if 
not resentment also. No man should cherish high 
thoughts of himself. Every frail mortal is ballasted 
with so many stains, follies, and shortcomings, that he 
should forbear to spread the wings of pride,. and invite 
the inspection of the world. The proud cannot see afar 
off. Haughtiness is a burden. It is also a serious 
obstruction in the way of prosperity. It is a blemish 
on the character that should be wiped off; and an 
excrescence that demands a sharp knife. It is, however, 
natural to a child of earth who regards himself as pos- 
sessed of marked superiority in wealth, position, or 
talents over others. And it is of rapid growth. Unlike 
other habitudes of great utility, the human soul takes 
this impress with facility and loses it with difficulty. 



Emotional Habitudes. 445 

We have seen a sudden elevation stamp a man with 
lia lit cur which he seemed for ever after to retain. Be- 
ware of pride. It brought a star of light of superior 
magnitude into the guilt of rebellion and the gloom of 
despair. 

To the precious emotion of Sympathy, we owe the 
Habitude of — 

9. Compassion. — This tenderness of feeling softens 
the asperities of men. It restrains from harsh proceed- 
ings when they might be justified. It prompts to mild, 
generous, and benevolent action when the stern would 
measure out severity. It feels for the destitute, the 
neglected, and the wretched. The sight of poverty, the 
cry of distress, and the sighing of the prisoner awakens 
this benign sensibility. It belongs to a suffering world. 
It has no scope for action where all is satisfaction and 
all is bliss. It is thus, as commonly understood, the 
result of sympathy as restricted to the suffering. It is 
not a term chosen to express the result of sympathy 
with the rejoicing. Our world needs a large number of 
compassionate men, for the number of the needy and 
the suffering is very great. To such we look for the 
spread of the kingdom of righteousness among those 
who are, and have long been, the victims of error, 
superstition, ' and crime. Without compassion, the 
human character has a marked defect. " Blessed are 
the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy." Infinite com- 
passion fills a large space in the inspired representations 
of the character of our Creator. It is one of the primary 
colours in that rainbow of glory which surrounds the 
eternal Throne, and has with propriety found a separate 
place in the enumerations of the perfections of Deity in 
every known standard of orthodoxy. When man 



446 Christian Psychology : 

recovers a resemblance to his Maker, genuine compas- 
sion will not be the least prominent feature. 

To the development of Zeal, we are indebted for the 
Habitude of — 

10. Enthusiasm. — Some men are endowed with great 
ardour. When a question of moment takes possession 
of such, they cannot refrain from pressing it on the 
attention of all. Zeal is a fire. It spreads as it burns. 
It makes a wide path for itself. Let zeal be kept alive 
on any subject, and the man soon becomes an enthu- 
siast. The subject that fills his thoughts commands 
the service of every power of mind and body. His time 
and strength are given to it. Such men are needed from 
time to time. Reformers must often be enthusiasts, if 
their ideas are to make way through formidable oppo- 
sition. The world now needs enthusiasts to overcome 
some of its formidable evils. The disbanding of standing 
armies which are a reproach to civilization, the univer- 
sal spread of the vice of intoxication, and the traffic 
and manufacture which originate and sustain it, and 
the evangelization of the heathen world by the arousing 
of cold, selfish, and slumbering Christendom, call for 
men of fire, whose souls are aglow with enthusiasm 
from the burning ideas which they foster in their 
breasts. And may we not add that the churches require 
some enthusiastic evangelist baptized with the Holy 
Ghost, to do the work performed by the seraphic 
Whitefield during last century. Enthusiasm requires 
control. The subject must be good which demands it ; 
and its exercise must never degenerate into wild-fire. 
Reason must control the most fervid animation. 

From the emotion of Wonder we have the common 
Habitude of — 



Emotional Habitudes. 447 

11. Curiosity. — If enthusiasm is rare, curiosity is 
very common. It is easily produced and easily sus- 
tained. The emotion of wonder rises in the youngest 
child, and excites even the grey head. On it the 
novelists trade. Without it the theatre would have 
many empty seats. Like other habitudes this one 
enlarges almost indefinitely, confirming the words of 
the wise man who long ago observed that the eye, by 
which he meant the mind inflamed with curiosity, was 
not satisfied with seeing. How readily do crowds rush 
to gaze on some reputed wonder. While useful in a 
high degree in the pursuit of science, or in the investi- 
gation of the unknown, it should never be expended on 
the unprofitable, the vain, or the vicious. Intended to 
facilitate progress in the path of wisdom, it should 
never be perverted to expedite the deluded in the path 
of disappointment and ruin. 

From Desire we have the powerful Habitude of — 

12. Covetousness. — This habitude results from the 
constant exercise of Desire in the securing of worldly 
possessions. The emotion has a much wider range, as 
is the case with sympathy and its consequence, com- 
passion, but this is a common and notable result. The 
Desire that first trickled in drops now rushes in a 
steady stream that almost defies any obstruction which 
the soul can raise. It is the master passion in the 
breasts of many who would be ashamed to own it. We 
may' well beware of the letting out of this water ; it 
deepens a channel before men are aware ; it acquires a 
power of which they are not conscious till the attempt 
is made to interfere with the acquisition of gain or the 
storing' up of wealth. So strong is this desire that it 
tramples down many noble considerations that it may 
grasp the coveted object. Truth, honour, justice, 



448 Christian Psychology : 

patriotism, the respect of men and the favour of God, 
are all disregarded at the dictation of his habitude. 
The acquisition of wealth is both honourable and legiti- 
mate. But covetousness is the prostration of the soul 
before mammon. The service of mammon unfits the 
soul for the duties of humanity and the worship of God. 
From frequent indulgence in the emotion of Fear we 
acquire the Habitude called — 

13. Timidity. — When fear is often evoked by sudden 
alarms, the mind becomes subject to disturbance by 
very trivial sounds. Let a man be frequently startled 
by the ringing of a fire-bell announcing an actual fire, 
the sound of any loud bell at night thrills him with fear 
of another conflagration. Let the footsteps of a burglar 
be heard more than once at the dead hour of night 
about his premises, filling him with such dread that he 
trembled, the recurrence of the sound will call up with 
greater ease the same dread. If a mother suffers herself 
to be agitated with fear whenever she hears the sudden 
cry of anguish from her child, she will become subject 
to frequent and distressing alarms if separated from the 
object of her care, as often as the sound of sorrow 
reaches her ear. Timidity may so far prevail that the 
sound of rustling leaves, or of a footstep at an unwonted 
time or place, or the shadow of a tree or post may 
agitate the heart, disturb the nerves, or possibly cause 
the hair of the head to stand erect. Fear within due 
bounds is wise and wholesome ; timidity results from 
frequent and excessive fear, and is a weakness and 
defect which should be resisted and overcome. 

To Shame we owe the gentle Habitude of — 

14. Modesty. — Some appear naturally modest. 
They possess a retiring and unassuming demeanour. 
If introduced into company they are flushed with shame, 



Emotional Habitudes. 449 

and desire to retire out of sight. They have no desire 
to stand forth before a multitude to be gazed upon. It 
is a relief when they pass along unnoticed. Modesty is 
good. It is especially becoming in the young and 
inexperienced. It is the very ornament of woman. 
She attracts when she retires, and repels when she 
approaches unsought and undesired. Still the goodness 
of modesty may be overdone in this selfish world. If 
man does not sometimes dash it aside, rude and unjust 
men would drive him from his place. Let shame have 
a moderate and regulated sway, and its attendant 
habitude will claim for us the respect of the intelligent 
and wise. 

Indulgence in the emotion of Anger ends in the 
troublesome Habitude of — 

15. Irritability. — This is a common infirmity. 
Many things occur to displease us. Some things are 
extremely provoking. If we give place to anger, it will 
demand a concession on the next provocation. As often 
as we suffer ourselves to be overcome by it, we facilitate 
its future rising, or widen the channel for its outflow. 
A character for impatience or irritability is soon formed, 
and we dread coming in opposition to such a man. He 
is said to explode in an instant ; or, that he cannot bear 
opposition ; or, that the slightest thing puts him out of 
temper ; or, that you cannot get a pleasant word from 
him if you offend him. Such men need to watch over 
the first movements of this emotion, or keep a heavy 
weight on the valve that allows the escape of the over- 
flow. A word may be hastily spoken, or an act 
performed, which pride will not suffer the man to recall 
or undo, which will leave a wound which years will not 
heal. It is well sometimes to be angry. Its absence 



45 o Christian Psychology : 

on some occasions would betray a weak and ignoble 
character ; but let not this form an excuse for indulging 
in habitual impatience, or conceding to a powerful 
emotion that license which will speedily form the 
troublesome and frequently injurious habitude of irrita- 
bility. " Let not the sun go down upon your wrath." 
Let it cease before sunset. " Be ye angry and sin not." 
Let it be legitimate in cause and effect. 

To the prevalence of Grief we owe the Habitude of — 
16. Sadness. — A severe bereavement brooded over 
will weigh down the spirit. Let this continue for 
months, and the countenance will betray the internal 
trouble preying upon the heart. Sadness will mark the 
look, speech, and action. A succession of troubles in 
the shape of disappointments and losses will frequently 
have the same effect. It is almost impossible to wear a 
pleasant face when all things seem to go against a man. 
In the majority of cases dullness, depression, and even 
sadness, will appear. Sadness is seldom protracted over 
years. Some may, indeed, say with the bereaved Jacob, 
" I will go to my grave bewailing my loss"; but such is 
the elasticity of the human spirit, that the use of 
ordinary means serves to relieve the heart of its burden, 
and restores, in some measure, the former animation. 
The loss of health is a common cause of sadness. In 
this case there may be no extreme sorrow, but there is a 
steady, though silent overflow of grief, which, from its 
frequent pressure, results in the Habitude that becomes 
apparent to every acquaintance. It is well, amidst the 
trials unavoidable in our journey through life, to cultivate, 
as a counteracting influence, an intimate acquaintance 
with the fountain of permanent joy. 



Emotional Habitudes. 45 1 



CHAPTER XLIV. 

EMOTIONAL HABITUDES-^/^m/. 

Division II. — From Combined Emotions. 

17. INDUSTRY. l8. COURAGE. ig. AMBITION. — 

20. REVENGE. 21. CHEERFULNESS. 

The following Habitudes are the result of the com- 
bined operation of two or more Emotions in prominent 
exercise : — 

From the combination of the Emotions of Desire and 
Zeal, we have the important Habitude of — 

17. Industry. — From either Desire or Zeal we may 
have activity, but mere activity is not industry. In 
industry we have a desire to possess goods or property, 
and we have a zeal in the employment of means 
regarded as adequate to attain the desired end. The 
diligent hand will generally secure a competence if not 
wealth. The habitude of industry is most profitable to 
individuals and to a community. It accords with the 
Divine admonition — " Not slothful in business." With- 
out industry in any undertaking, we have no reason to 
look for success. In the exercise of sound judgment, a 
proper end should be selected on which to set our 
hearts, and the best means chosen to reach that end ; 
and then the motive power of these strong emotions 
should be applied to the working of the means. Their 
combined influence will cut a channel for a free outlet 



45 2 Christian Psychology : 

of the active energies of the man, which will render 
indolence or inactivity both a burden and a bondage. 
A pressure similar to the steady gravitating power of 
the weight of a clock will impel to a regular and 
constant occupation which, if not overdone, will be 
productive of health, wealth, and reputation. 

To the combined influence of the Emotions of Hope 
and Fear, we owe the useful Habitude of — 

1 8. Courage. — By fear we are excited, aroused, and 
all the energies of the man brought to the very point 
of action. By hope we see a way of escape from 
present disadvantage, difficulty, or danger, either pos- 
sible, probable or certain. By the blending of the two 
we resist with all our might the evil, and seize with all 
our energy the good. Fear, without hope, might only 
paralyze ; hope, without fear, might be deficient in 
energy. May we not have courage without fear ? Is it 
not the very absence of fear ? We may not have 
courage without the animation or inspiration of fear, for 
courage respects danger ; and where there is danger, 
fear is the natural emotion. But when the sense of 
danger has roused the emotion of fear, the energies of 
the man are called up, and there is scope for the coun- 
teractive influence of any other power. If fear prevails, 
although the energies of the man are aroused, he may 
display timidity, and not courage. But if, when danger 
has been fully apprehended, and the man all alive to it, 
the emotion of hope rises to influence, and swells up to 
paramount authority, the fear of being overborne and 
crushed, and the hope of successful resistance and 
victory combine, the one in its native tendency to resist 
the enemy, or the danger ; the other in its native ten- 
dency to grasp the vantage ground, the victory, and the 



Emotional Habitudes. 453 

safety, and the man of genuine courage rises to our view. 
Two of the strongest powers unite in forming the noble 
habitude of courage. If we give fear the first place in 
point of time, we ascribe to hope the highest place in 
point of authority. It lifts the head in the hour of battle, 
but it needs the ardour of fear to nerve the arm. If 
there is no fear we may have vain confidence, or fool- 
hardiness with its usual consequence. If there is no 
hope, we are overcome by fear, or sink in despair, or 
await in silent firmness the issue. To this honourable 
attribute of the human soul we owe much of the pro- 
gress, political and moral, scientific and religious of our 
race. 

From Pride and Envy we may derive the daring 
Habitude of — 

19. Ambition. — In war, politics, science, and even 
religion, this habitude has displayed its power. A man 
is filled with the emotion of self-esteem in one of its 
objectionable forms, and casting his eye around beholds 
another, in the same line of business or occupation 
with himself, occupying a higher seat, wielding more 
influence, receiving more homage, or accumulating more 
wealth ; envy is evoked, and it uniting with pride, an 
aspiration linked to a resolution is formed, to win the 
higher place and secure the coveted prize. There 
is a species of ambition, as there is a species of pride 
and of covetousness, which is both legitimate and 
praiseworthy. This honourable ambition is the result of 
Pride and Desire combining within a certain limited 
range. When men desire to excel in art, in speech, in 
writing, or in moral rectitude, there is a form of am- 
bition ; for with the emotion of Desire there is blended 
beyond question a perceptible measure of self-esteem, 



454 Christian Psychology : 

one of the forms of pride. But when envy is blended 
with pride, the compound ceases to be praiseworthy, 
for it is dangerous. There is no good in envy. And 
yet it is a very common and powerful emotion. Men 
and women are envied for their wealth, position, 
houses, equipage, personal appearance and even dress. 
Let pride lend a helping hand to this emotion, and 
the aspiration or ambition is formed to rival the object 
envied. If pride is at the bottom, envy cannot keep 
its head down. The two emotions blend with ease. 
And they form a powerful impulse to action. That 
action has often been the natural fruit of such roots. 
Men are willing to pull down others that they may 
mount up ; and if they cannot ascend, they strive to 
reduce others to their own level that envy may be 
appeased. How many have been goaded on by this 
evil influence to their own ruin. Dissatisfied with their 
condition and envious of those above them, they have 
given the reins to an evil ambition which has landed 
them in inextricable difficulties. 

In the blending of the Emotions of Hatred and Anger 
we have the destructive Habitude of — 

20. Revenge. — We may be angry without hating ; 
and we may hate without being angry. But when we 
both hate and are angry with the same person, we are 
roused to strong antagonism. In revenge there is a 
determination to have satisfaction, generally by inflicting 
injury for some real or supposed wrong done to us or to 
those whose cause we make our own. We look at the 
injury, and we are displeased with the offender; our 
displeasure may attain to the height of wrath, if the 
injury is great. We consider the motive, and if the 
deed is regarded as the result of malice and cherished 



Emotional Habitudes. 45 5 

ill-will, we dislike the offender and our dislike may attain 
the height of extreme loathing. Anger and hatred 
prompt retaliation for injury. That retaliation is revenge. 
Anger alone often prompts retaliation. A man gets a 
blow on the head. If irritable or subject to the im- 
pulses of anger it is probable that he will be prompted 
to retaliate on the spot, by striking back, in revenge, 
the man who struck him. So, too, the man who is 
defamed in the public press is provoked by his keen 
displeasure to retaliate on his defamer by an exposure 
of his evil deeds, or on the publisher for spreading, so 
iniquitously, such defamation. If anger kindles the 
fire, hatred will keep it burning. Both are often cruel 
as the grave. Revenge generally assumes the form of 
resolute and prolonged retaliation. It is not the mere 
blending of the emotions anger and hatred, but the 
ordinary result of both united. Men who give way to 
both are generally cruel and revengeful. A powerful 
restraint should be put upon revenge, by a restraint upon 
both anger and hatred. Revenge belongs to God. We 
are incompetent, in most cases, to deal with it. This, 
however, does not apply to the exercise of public justice. 
What is unbecoming in the individual member of society 
may be perfectly legitimate to its constituted authorities. 

And from the pleasurable Emotions of Joy and Hope 
we have the agreeable Habitude of — 

21. Cheerfulness. — The cultivation of Joy is happi- 
ness. When Hope blends with it the volume of bliss is 
not only stronger but there is added the brightness of 
pleasing expectation. Let these be our favourite 
emotions, and cheerfulness will leave its impress broad 
and deep upon our souls. And let this also be our care 



456 Christian Psychology : 

that the spring of both lie deep in the abiding love of 
God, and the faithful discharge of every known duty. 

We do not profess to have enumerated all the 
Emotional Habitudes ; but these may be regarded as a 
satisfactory, if not a perfect, exhibition. There are 
Habitudes the result of the defective development of 
emotions, as Indolence and Apathy, but we do not deem 
them deserving a separate consideration. 



Executive Habitudes. 457 



CHAPTER XLV. 

EXECUTIVE HABITUDES. 

Introduction : — 

i. swiftness. 2. slowness. 3. firmness. 4. fickle- 
ness. 5. orderliness. 6. disorderliness. 

A little close thought will reveal to us that the 
human spirit throws itself, its person, strength, and 
energy, into any of the four departments, predominantly 
and specially exercised. If the Intellect is predominantly 
exercised, it seems to take up its position for a time, as 
if its residence, in that department. If the Emotional 
susceptibility is specially exercised by any one feeling 
overspreading the soul, the personality of the spirit 
seems to rest there, as if absorbed in the emotion. If 
the Will is called to work with marked determination on 
any settled project, the whole man seems to take up his 
abode in the Will. He does visit the other departments, 
but it is in subserviency to the project in hand, and he 
returns to assume his seat and control all movements. 
If the Normal faculty has been aroused to take cog- 
nizance of some transaction deeply affecting the relation 
of man to his supreme Judge, in a moment the whole 
spirit is absorbed in the department of conscience ; 
whatever belongs to the essentials of the person, as 
a separate undivided intelligence, in plain terms, the 
spirit, the man, assumes the throne of conscience, and 

FF 



458 Christian Psychology : 

impels or restrains every other faculty in subservience 
to what is now felt to be the path of duty. 

The want of attention to these facts, for they are facts 
and not mere phantoms, has led some writers in mental 
science to present a partial and so far defective view of 
psychology. With some writers the intellect receives 
the place of honour, the Reason is the Ego or the 
personal individual spirit, and all other powers are sub- 
sidiary. With others, the Will is the man ; it is the 
head, the chief authority, without whom nothing has 
any claim for attention or compensation ; it is the Ego, 
the seat of morality, and of all responsibility. Now the 
truth is, the Emotional and Normal Departments belong 
as much to the man, the Ego, the indivisible spirit, as 
the Intellectual and Executive Departments, although 
they may in most individuals be less prominent ; and 
the spirit may be influenced by, occupied with, and for 
the time apparently seated in any one of the four. The 
human spirit, under the sustaining power of the creating, 
omnipresent Spirit, is self-acting, and, as a rule, inces- 
santly moving. It has no existence separate from its 
faculties. Its existence is a combination of faculties, 
living and self-acting. Any one faculty is not the spirit. 
The human spirit is a union of the whole. A spirit 
might have other faculties. While we distinguish in 
thought the faculties from the life which animates them, 
we cannot imagine the faculties as existing apart from 
life, nor a spiritual life devoid of faculties. We do not 
know that thought can reach farther. 

During waking hours the Executive power or will is 
almost incessantly occupied. It is either attending to 
the ten thousand incidents of thought and feeling as 
they arise, or following out some settled purpose in 



Executive Habitudes. 459 

regular and continuous work. Most men have their 
ordinary employment. To the performance of its duties 
the will sets the powers of the mind and body to work 
as a thing already determined upon. The intellect is 
mainly occupied along with the physical powers of the 
body, but the emotional and normal departments have 
often their turn of exercise, as the carpenter in planeing 
his boards may be led to admire the beautiful cellular 
tissue of the wood, and the merchant may be arrested 
by conscience in the act of disposing of his goods for an 
exaggerated statement in regard to the price or quality 
of the article. 

The will is subject to the ordinary law respecting the 
exercise of powers. The exercise of any power or 
faculty in any particular form, with due moderation, 
results in an increased facility of action, and that action 
becoming regular and continuous for a period of time, 
produces a Habitude. The movements of the Executive 
power may be described in respect to time as swift or 
slow ; in respect to strength, as firm or fickle ; and in 
respect to manner, as orderly or disorderly. Hence the 
Habitudes which may deserve our brief consideration 
are Swiftness and Slowness, Firmness and Fickleness, 
Orderliness and Disorderliness. 

1. Swiftness. — This Habitude is of two kinds. The 
one results from constant regularly defined action, as 
the slater or shingler driving his nails with the uni- 
form number of blows. The other results from swift 
determinations in irregular and varying actions within 
a defined circle or occupation. Certain callings neces- 
sitate swift determinations if disgrace and disaster would 
be avoided. The fiery movements of the battle field can 
scarcely be brought in as illustrations, for they are 



460 Christian Psychology : 

clearly exceptional. But the prompt action of sea cap- 
tains, engine drivers, and drill sergeants, proved to be 
competent for their undertaking, ma)' be referred to. 
Where there is ever-recurring danger, and specially at 
irregular intervals, disaster can only be avoided by the 
power of swift determination. That power may be 
acquired, and become a valuable habitude. It must be 
attended with keen discernment and sound judgment, or 
the swiftness may illustrate the old saying, — " The more 
hurry, the less speed." Rightly exercised it is of 
unquestionable service. The man who has what is 
called " presence of mind," which really is the power of 
cool but swift determination, to seize the unexploded 
shell and throw it into the sea or over the parapet, or 
grasp the wheel and, by a rapid whirl, in the moment of 
extreme peril, save his ship from instant collision, or 
smother, by the closing of a door, at great personal risk, 
the devouring element ready to burst into a general con- 
flagration, shows the value of such a habitude. It is 
often the immediate antecedent of safety, honor, and 
wealth. While generally profitable under all circum- 
stances, its cultivation is imperative in undertakings that 
are perilous, and where activity is indispensable. 

2. Slowness. — Where dullness of intellect or extreme 
caution exists, the habitude of Slowness of determina- 
tion is readily formed. Not perceiving what should be 
done at once man moves slowly ; not comprehending 
what is best amidst a variety of things, he may not make 
up his mind without a seeming tedious delay. This 
habitude is not wholly injurious. It has its advantages 
as an offset to its disadvantages. If the man moves or 
works slowly and deliberately he is not likely to wear out 
or break down so soon as the swift-moving. And if he 



Executive Habitudes. 461 

is very cautious in determining any course of action, he 
is not so liable to commit blunders as the more incon- 
siderate or hasty. As the will depends so largely on the 
intellect, the slowness of the former is, in truth, the result 
of the slowness of the latter. The man who is dim in 
perception, or slow in apprehension, will be slow in 
volition. The disadvantages arising from this habitude 
greatly overbalance the advantages. Loss of time, 
temper, money, character, and even life, may be frequent 
results. In some occupations slowness becomes in- 
tolerable. The patience of those who wait for the 
execution of the promised work is worn out. Take for 
illustration the conduct of some lawyers. They accept 
a task committed to their care ; but when will it leave 
their hands ? How many fruitless visits to an office with 
the same provoking indecision, and delay of settlement ? 
While some are hesitating others step forward and win 
the prize. Let us strive to combine calmness of judg- 
ment with prompt decision and active exertion. 

3. Firmness. — This is an essential element in great- 
ness. Without firmness no man can acquire that solidity 
and stability which are the foundation of true moral 
worth. Hence this habitude is one of the most valuable 
that man can possess. It may seem a natural rather 
than an acquired power. Beyond question, as some are, 
by nature, distinguished above others for intellectual 
capacity, so some are, by nature, possessed of greater 
executive power than others. Some are naturally vacil- 
lating, others are obstinate. But firmness has been and 
may be acquired ; and has, by right, a place among the 
most useful habitudes of the human soul. 

By it the child adheres to the admonitions of his 
parent or teacher, and refuses to steal the attractive 



462 Christian Psychology : 

object lying in his way, or to utter a statement opposed 
to the truth ; the youth rejects the temptation to taste 
the intoxicating glass, or join in the pleasure excursion 
on the holy Sabbath, though strongly pressed to do so ; 
the man of business has the power to repel the sugges- 
tion of acquiring wealth by means of fraud ; and the 
man of principle holds his own while torrents of opposi- 
tions dash wildly against him. By it the martyr held 
fast to the truth while his bones were dislocated by the 
rack, and while the faggots were piled around his feet at 
the stake. By it the hero holds his ground on the field 
of battle, or on the parapet of the fort, while deadly 
bullets fall fast around him. By it the man of honest 
industry adheres to his calling, unmoved by the splen- 
dour of some who have become suddenly rich by 
hazardous speculations. And by it the man of literature 
and science prosecutes his investigations and researches 
with a tenacity of purpose that is often injurous to 
mind and body, but which seldom fails of results highly 
beneficial to others. 

This habitude is an anchor which may save the ship 
from being either driven out to sea, or dashed on the 
rocks in time of tempest or of current. As the anchor 
should be dropped, if possible, in good holding ground, 
where there is safe anchorage, so we should take 
hold on safe, sound principles, and adhere to them 
with intelligence and firmness. The extreme of 
obstinancy should be avoided. This is an unreason- 
able and blind tenacity of purpose. There is a time 
to yield as well as to stand firm. When men are all 
wise, and always wise, yielding may be unnecessary ; 
till then, man should be open to conviction, and 
willing to receive instruction. The safety and honour 



Executive Habitudes. 463 

of many depend on their abandoning positions which 
they have long held in the face of strong opposi- 
tion, but which, nevertheless, are false and ruinous 
positions. We are to stand fast on the foundation of 
truth, not of error ; and to hold our ground in a position 
of integrity and honour, not of fraud and dishonour. 
Firmness acquires strength by cultivation and success- 
ful resistance to opposition ; but its growth must be 
watched, that intelligence may keep pace with it ; and 
the positions assumed as safe and correct be ever 
subject to faithful and strict review. 

4. Fickleness. — This is the opposite in some respects 
to Firmness. It is readily acquired. Let a man be 
easily driven from half-a-dozen positions, or persuaded 
to abandon three or four different occupations, and he 
becomes a rolling stone which " gathers no moss," a 
changeable man who secures no property. The gold- 
fields of Australasia have afforded many exhibitions of 
this habitude in one of its common forms, a roving 
disposition. Like the common sailor or servant who 
likes frequent changes, the gold-digger is often a land 
rover, who has no heart to stay long in one place. 
Fickleness in opinions plays some strange pranks. The 
man who turns with every wind of doctrine may be 
seen " boxing the compass " every twelve months. 
And the man who cannot settle himself down to any 
steady occupation, is tailor, shoemaker, blacksmith, and 
carpenter, by turns. This habitude is weakness. It 
has nothing to commend it. It fails in securing respect. 
Success or prosperity is almost impossible. Men are 
not expected to advance when they are performing 
circles. Fickleness is not change but changeableness. 
Change is often wise and necessary. But frequent 



464 Christian Psychology : 

changes are not profitable, and seldom desirable. The 
tree that will not take root cannot bear fruit. The 
fickle man carries no weight in the community in which 
he dwells. You cannot place your foot with safety on a 
rolling stone. Let the strong brace up the fickle, as the 
newly-planted tree is tied to stakes until it can take 
root. The feeble weed bending to every wind may 
become the goodly olive, if not the sturdy cedar. 

5. Orderliness. — This Habitude is one of the essen- 
tial elements of success amid the active occupations of 
life. Order relieves the mind from perplexity and 
facilitates work. It leaves open paths through the 
thicket of engagements, instead of compelling the 
traveller to explore and force his way at every call of 
duty. Order reigns in the material universe, and there- 
fore has its fountain in the Creator. The human spirit 
is endowed with a high capacity for order. While 
common intellects delight in classification and order, 
the very highest rank find congenial occupation in 
tracing the loftier displays of this development of wis- 
dom. Were it not that sloth and carelessness are 
deeply embedded in many constitutions, this most 
useful habitude could be readily acquired, as it accords 
with a deep-seated instinct or natural proclivity. 

Orderliness saves time, strength, and temper. In 
large establishments progress is impossible without it. 
Government, war, politics, law, fall into the greatest 
confusion unless the leading minds in these occupations 
are under its regulating influence. Its demands are 
simple, yet all-embracing. They are a time and a place 
for every important work, and every such work in its 
time and place. In the formation and maintenance of 
this habitude, the intellect has a prominent part. 



Executive Habitudes. 465 

Under its suggestions the will is excited to volition. 
And by its links of association one thing follows another 
in the order in which they have been arranged, leading 
to the assumption of each work in its time and place. 
In every executive habitude the intellect may be 
regarded as an introductory and co-operative agent. 
Punctuality and form are part aspects of orderliness. 
The one may be looked upon as essential, the other is a 
valuable assistant. Form enters largely into order. 
We like to operate after a model. Similarity in effects 
produces facility in action. 

It is possible to carry order to excess. The mind has 
become in a measure enslaved when a man cannot 
work out of his accustomed grove, or depart from a 
form to which he has been accustomed, or employ a 
tool with which he has had no familiarity. Men may 
become punctilious. In such cases time and strength 
gained by the habitude within due limits are needlessly 
expended. Hence the intellect must be kept free to 
look beyond the limited circle of action, that volitions 
may receive from time to time such modifications as 
prudence may direct. With an intellect kept wide 
awake to improvements, orderliness presents a beauty, 
strength, facility, and attractiveness which should 
secure its adoption by all involved in the activities of 
life, ordinary or professional. 

6. Disorderliness. — This is the habitual perform- 
ance of ordinary work, without respect to time or place. 
It is the opposite of the preceding, and has nothing to 
recommend it. It is generally the result of constant 
inattention and carelessness. No proper estimate of the 
value of time and strength can be formed where it 
constantly prevails. It is not chosen by the mind as 



466 Christian Psychology : 

something desirable, but it is often submitted to, ap- 
parently from necessity ; the mind not possessing 
sufficient executive power to restore order amid ever 
recurring disorder, or the person being subjected to such 
irregular disturbances at his work as to disarrange any 
plan that can be adopted. 

In its worst form this habitude is the effect of sheer 
indifference ; in its most excusable form, it is the result 
of circumstances. In both cases it is an injury and 
loss. Progress in importaut undertakings is at best 
greatly retarded, and is sometimes impossible. The 
character is weakened. The intellect suffers in perfect 
development. A regard for form, neatness, and personal 
attraction disappears. Trouble is a regular attendant. 
Dissatisfaction with self and all others is frequent. The 
displacement of one important duty is the displacement 
of all that hangs upon it. And time repeatedly lost at 
irregular intervals produces confusion. Peace is a 
stranger, and happiness is a rare guest. If work presses, 
hurry is inevitable and imperfection certain. As the 
habitude is developed, the man becomes the creature 
of impulse rather than of calm reflection ; and his will 
is adapted to fitful exertion rather than steady and con- 
tinuous action. Disorderliness, therefore, tends to the 
weakness of intellect, will, and physical aptitude for 
profitable employment. Let us apprehend what our 
duties are, and firmly resolve to do them at the proper 
time and in the best manner. 



Normal Habitudes. 467 



CHAPTER XLVI. 

NORMAL HABITUDES. 
I. SUBJECTION. 2. AUTHORITY. 

.Although the Normal faculty has peculiarities 
which widely distinguish it from other faculties, as its 
power to impel, its authority to command, and its 
severity to punish, it is subject to the consequences of 
restraint or development, repression or exercise, which 
appear natural to the powers of a spirit linked to matter. 
Prolonged restraint or continuous freedom leaves per- 
manent results. As the influence of the Normal faculty 
is directed to the regulation of conduct amidst the 
constant changes and varied duties of life, its opera- 
tions are most readily traced where it has acquired 
settled control. But as lasting consequences follow 
from the steady repression as well as the regular exer- 
tion of a faculty, the habitudes formed in both cases may 
claim a common designation, though not on precisely 
the same grounds, and may deserve a contiguous 
presentation. It is thus with conscience. A moral 
habitude is formed by the constant repression of this 
faculty, as well as by its unfettered exercise. These 
spiritual states may be termed Subjection and Authority. 
The middle ground is occupied by a great multitude, 
who do not persistently refuse to listen to the voice of 
conscience, but who are equally indisposed to subject 



468 Christian Psychology : 

their conduct to its control ; they refuse, and they obey, 
according to the strength of passing influences ; and 
hence no habitude can be formed unless moral irregu- 
larity can be classed as such. Leaving out of con- 
sideration what is necessarily so indefinite, we shall 
briefly notice the two Normal habitudes named. 

i. — Subjection. — A contest has taken place in the 
human soul. Sin has triumphed. The evil has pre- 
vailed over the good. The struggle has been repeated, 
and with the same results. Repeated triumphs has 
given sin an established supremacy. Conscience is not 
destroyed. The state of which we speak is constant if 
not invariable subjection without extinction of opposi- 
tion. The Normal faculty is neither torpid, and thus 
indifferent to the conduct pursued, nor perverted, and 
thus approving of wrong. It has been conquered, and 
put down from authority, and is now held in subjection. 
In this state its feeble opposition is overborne. If it 
would speak silence is enjoined. The feeble hand 
raised to prevent entering on a sinful course is pushed 
aside without ceremony. Its testimony is discarded as 
unworthy of credit. Its attempts at reproof are met 
with instant rebuke. 

Hence the man who has habituated himself to false 
statements, prevaricates, exaggerates, or lies, with the 
bold countenance of one who feels his superiority over 
all internal opposition. The man who steals by pil- 
fering, dishonesty, or extortion, may hear a low whisper 
in his bosom, that his conduct is not just ; but having 
often heard and hushed the same voice in similar cir- 
cumstances, he now simply says, — " What matters 
it ? " and holds on his way. The Sabbath-breaker, 
who, in early life had often read the words — " Remem- 



Normal Habitudes. 469 

ber the Sabbath day to keep it holy" — but who, in later 
years, by evil example and the solicitations of ungodly 
companions, had overborne the remonstrances of con- 
science, and made the day one of mere sloth or worldly 
pleasure, now accepts an invitation for a pleasure 
excursion on that day with a courage and assurance 
that says to conscience — Don't open your lips or 
whisper a breath of dissent. In the same way the 
person following a licentious course hears from time to 
time earnest admonitions, as of an aggrieved friend, in 
his own bosom ; but rejects the advice, yields to the 
temptation, and accelerates his progress to corruption 
by the double process of increasing the power of sin, by 
indulgence, and weakening the power of resistance, by 
habitual subjection of conscience to the dominant lust. 

This Habitude reveals a state of marked guilt. The 
man is manifestly and unmistakeably a sinner. He is 
at war with his own higher nature, is in opposition to 
the moral law which governs rational creatures, and 
must be in rebellion against the Being who made and 
governs him. Peace he has not, and cannot have, till 
he rids himself of this department of his nature, which 
is as impossible as to annihilate himself. Poor guilty 
man ! Sin has obtained dominion. To yield submis- 
sion to it is to plunge into perdition. For effectual 
resistance he can find no strength. " Video meliora 
proboque, deteriora sequor" 

2. Authority. — The case is reversed. Help has come 
from the merciful Creator. Sin has lost its dominion. 
Grace has triumphed. The Normal power has received 
fresh life from the great Fountain of order and rectitude. 
It reassumes the throne of the creature to regulate the 
moral conduct. To it the renewed man is generally and 



470 Christian Psychology : 

habitually subject. Then the life flows evenly and 
quietly along with the silent and gentle gliding of a 
deep and placid stream. The voice of conscience may 
be seldom heard while its authority is readily acquiesced 
in by a constant and careful obedience to the law of 
truth, honesty, and holiness. But let duty be neglected 
or moral mistakes committed, immediately the corrector's 
voice is heard, and his demands are a prompt attention 
to duty and a full reparation of the injury. The authority 
is recognised, and obedience follows, conjoined with 
feelings of regret for the past shortcomings. While a 
careful comparison of this internal authority with the 
external revealed will of God may be required, there is 
no desire to resist conscience, no complaint for its 
rebukes, but a wish to honour and respect the faithful 
monitor. It is regarded as a friend, not an enemy ; and 
so long as it accords with the mind of the supreme Ruler, 
and repeats his will or pleasure, the man is willingly and 
cheerfully submissive. 

To such the term "conscientious" belongs. He may 
not be always right, for no man is infallible, but he aims 
to be right. And he claims respect from his known 
integrity even when he is seen to be wrong. His will is 
to rob neither God nor man of what is justly his, but to 
render to both what is their due. The fear of God is 
before his eyes, and therefore the fear of man will not 
deter him from doing what is seen and felt to be right. 
Under the direction of an enlightened conscience his 
settled purpose is to " deny himself to ungodliness and 
worldly lusts, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly 
in this present evil world." His character has a decidedly 
negative, as well as a resolutely positive, side. He 
steadfastly refuses the evil, and firmly adheres to the 



Normal Habitudes. 471 

good. The one he abhors under strong persuasions to 
the contrary, the other he delights in, in the face of oppo- 
sition or apathy. Let such men of honour, of principle, 
and of rectitude, possess a land, and its moral power 
will carry an influence over the earth which no extent of 
riches or strength of armies can ever procure. There is 
a power in goodness with which numbers and physical 
energy cannot compete, which wealth cannot equal, and 
with which talent cannot bs compared. The Almighty 
stands on the side of rectitude. God is with the righteous. 
And his influence outweighs all creation. But let no 
man make his own conscience the supreme standard of 
duty. The only infallible standard on earth is the 
revealed word of God. As the careful mariner, before 
proceeding to sea, takes his compass to the standard 
compass established by government, of unquestionable 
power and trueness, to have it compared, tested, and 
rectified if necessary, so the conscientious man before 
proceeding to any important duty should bring his con- 
science to the great standard of rectitude for comparison 
and adjustment. And as the magnetic power of the 
compass may be restored or increased by the use of the 
loadstone, so may the spiritual power and sensibility of 
conscience be increased or restored by fervent prayer to 
the great all-pervading Spirit, while exploring his word 
for the certainty of truth. Happy is the man whose con- 
duct is habitually regulated by a conscience under the 
influence of an enlightened reason and a heaven-born 
faith. 



472 Christian Psychology : 



CHAPTER XLVII. 



CONCLUSION 



MORAL DISPOSITIONS PROGRESSIVE AND DETERMINATIVE. 

Man is destined for eternity. The human spirit is 
immortal. The deductions of reason from the aspira- 
tions, tendencies, and capacities of man's nature are 
amply confirmed by the clearest declarations of a divine 
revelation. That eternity is shaped and determined by 
the moral dispositions of the present life. Man's moral 
nature is the highest part of his being. Through it the 
chief end of his existence is attained. All other powers 
or faculties are subservient to it. Its condition, ten- 
dency, or disposition defines the relationship subsisting 
between the being and his Creator. If the normal 
faculty, the regulating power of all that is moral in 
man is possessed of life and light, and is promptly 
responsive to the will of the Supreme, not only does 
harmony subsist between the creature and his Maker, 
but the full purposes of being are accomplished to the 
delight of God and the perfect happiness of man. But 
if the normal faculty is blighted, darkened, and deadened, 
and ceases to respond to the will of God, and has lost 
control over the subordinate faculties of the soul, the 
man is alienated from his Maker, he is in rebellion 
against his authority, the natural purposes of existence 
are not accomplished, the creature becomes offensive 
and repulsive in the sight of the Creator, and his very 



Conclusion. 473 

being filled with dissatisfaction, distress, and anguish. 
Life illumines and matures the one ; death holds its 
dark and corrupting sway over the other. 

Creation is subject to change. The Creator, while 
unchangeable in character and purpose, operates with 
endless variety throughout his empire. Inanimate 
matter, so far as it comes within man's observation, is 
liable to incessant alteration in quantity, quality, form, 
or colour. Vegetable and animal life have their limit, 
beyond which they cannot go. Like the arrow shot 
upward, when the impelling force is exhausted, another 
power prevails, and it is brought back to the earth. 
In the life of both there is a stretching after maturity ; a 
pressing upward in development to reach a destined 
natural goal ; beyond this, instinct has no want unsatis- 
fied. And yet how great the variety in the duration of 
both vegetable and animal life. One plant may reach 
its maturity in a few months, another may continue to 
grow for centuries. An- insect may finish its natural 
life in a few days, an elephant in scores of years. Up 
to a certain point development extends, and life pre- 
vails. Beyond that a new power acquires supreme 
force, and the once animated structure is brought back 
to its original unorganised matter. 

Rational or spirit life is greatly superior to mere 
animal life, and has an unending existence allotted to it. 
Its perfect development it is impossible for us fully to 
comprehend. But there is a determinative stage of 
development which we may apprehend. Some trees 
and animals live long after they have reached their full 
height, and laterally expand and otherwise mature. In 
like manner the human spirit may reach a stage of 
upward or downward progress, in which life or death 



474 Christian Psychology: 

may obtain unfettered sway, without absolutely ter- 
minating development in either case. A man may 
struggle successfully with disease until the last trace of 
it is eradicated from his constitution ; or disease may 
struggle successfully with him until it has overpowered 
the last element of vitality in the system, and the body 
is dead. In both cases a marked and determinative 
stage of development is reached ; but in neither case 
does the dominant power cease to operate ; on 
the contrary, its accelerated action still goes on 
though it may be in a modified form. A spirit from 
earth, raised to heaven and perfected in life by having 
the last stain of sin removed, may continue to enjoy an 
intellectual and emotional expansion with their corres- 
ponding results, through an indefinite period. And one 
of the same race, perfectly subdued by sin and steeped 
in corruption, without an element of goodness remaining, 
may, sealed under condemnation and imprisoned in 
darkness, develope through countless ages such faculties 
as a consciousness of guilt, banishment, degradation, 
and remorse can foster. 

The moral disposition, or the determined bias of the 
normal faculty, indicates the dominant power in the 
human soul, and its heaven-ward or hell-ward tendency. 
The normal faculty is in itself a controlling and regu- 
lating faculty ; but it is controlled by one of two superior 
powers which may be designated sin and grace, death 
and life. Sin is disease, moral death, and embryotic 
damnation ; grace is vitality, spiritual life, and embryotic 
glory. As disease is an active power, and prevails 
according to its strength, so life is an active power and 
subdues all opposition within its control. As a deplor- 
able but undeniable fact, sin a moral disease maturing 



Conclusion. 475 

in unending woe, has seized upon and prevails over the 
human spirit. On the other hand, within, as yet, a 
limited circle of the adult population of our globe, 
grace, heavenly vitality terminating in everlasting 
glory, has descended upon and taken possession of 
spirits of the same race. Prevailing vital power pro- 
gresses. Life is activity, and activity is progress. 
Opposition to prevailing power developes fresh activity ; 
and victory confirms authority and influence. 

By nature inherited from fallen parents all our race 
are under the dominion of this moral disease, sin, which 
reigns unto death. Through its prevailing influence the 
normal faculty is neutralized, overcome, or perverted, so 
that it cannot regulate or keep the soul according to the 
will of God. It may retard, but cannot restrain the 
ravages of sin, which spreads like a cancer and consumes 
like a flame. Man is mortally diseased beyond the 
power of human remedy. But where sin abounded, 
grace has superabounded. A physician from heaven has 
visited our world. He is the Prince of Life, and com- 
municates the grace of life to whom he pleases. He 
offers as a gift vitality, spiritual life, and eternal glory to 
ail who will personally apply with true faith. This 
spiritual life, once received, asserts supremacy in the 
human soul, resists, overthrows, and eventually expels 
sin from the whole nature. Thus on this earth, at the 
same time, these two prevailing powers, sin and grace, 
moral disease and spiritual vitality, operating within the 
moral nature of man, are maturing their respective 
subjects, the one for woe, the other for bliss — the one for 
dishonour, the other for glory. 

There is a limit to opposition from a subdued force. 
By a double process, the diminution of its strength and 



476 Christian Psychology. 

the increase of power to the dominant influence, the 
time may soon arrive when opposition disappears. This 
is true of man's moral history. Sin and grace both 
prevail over all opposition within the brief period allowed 
to man on earth. In the one case, sin having so long and 
so far prevailed, all opposition to the downward career from 
the providence and Spirit of God is withdrawn ; and the 
voice of the supreme Judge is heard proclaiming — Let 
him that is unjust be unjust still, and let him that is filthy 
be filthy still, and for ever. In the other, grace having so 
long and so far prevailed, all opposition from the world, 
the flesh, and the devil for ever ceases by the removal of 
the soul to a region of perfect life and holiness ; when 
in effect, the same voice proclaims — Let him that is 
righteous be righteous still, and let him that is holy be 
holy still, and for ever. The moral character has 
determined the state and position of the soul during its 
future and everlasting existence. In the nature of things 
the triumph of sin, without restraint, must render the one 
eternally wretched ; and the triumph of grace, without 
opposition, render the other eternally blessed. May 
the reader, with the writer, know the blessedness of exis- 
tence perfected by grace and perpetuated in glory, 



THE END. 



Index. 477 



INDEX. 



Application — Attention, 32. Abstraction, 37. Apprehension, 21. 
Appropriation, 45. Architecture, 52. Anger, 164. Apprehension, 
Clearness of, 429. Ambition, 453. Authority, 469. 

Branch Forms, 91. Benevolence, 439. 

Conception — Comprehension, 21. Classification, 45. Composition, 52. 
Construction, 52. Capacity, 86. Calculation, Quickness of, 430. 
Composition, Readiness of, 430. Confidence, 441. Compassion, 
445. Curiosity, 447. Covetousness, 447. Courage, 452. Cheer- 
fulness, 455. Conclusion, 472. 

Distinction — Division, 37. Distribution, 45. Deduction, 58. Depression, 
183. Desire, 217. Distinction, Acuteness of, 432. Disorderliness, 
465. Dispositions — Moral, Determinative, 474. 

Exhibition, 79. Emotional Nature, 92. Emotional Divisions, 99. Envy, 
149. Executive Power, 226. Enthusiasm, 446. Endowment, A 
Tessarene, 417. 

Fear, 177. Firmness, 461. Fickleness, 463. 

Grasp, 86. Gratitude, 101. Grief, 170. Grasp, Comprehensiveness 
of, 433- 

Hope, 107. Hatred, 142. Habitudes — Intellectual, 424 ; Emotional, 436 ; 
Executive, 457 ; Normal, 467. Happiness, 441. Haughtiness, 444. 

Introduction, 9. Imagination, 52. Intellectual Capacity, 21. Inquisition, 
67. Introspection, 67. Irritability, 449. Industry, 451. 



478 Index. 

Joy, 123. Jealousy, 157. Judgment, Promptness of, 434. 

Love, 113. 

Modesty, 448. Moral Dispositions, 472. 

Orderliness, 464. 

Psychologist, The, II. Divine Psychology, 412. Prospection, 67. Per- 
ception, 21. Presentation, 79. Penetration, 32. Pride, 128. Piety, 
436. Patriotism, 438. 

Ratiocination, 58. Retrospection, 67. Representation, 79. Retention, 
86. Revenge, 454. 

Symmetrization, 45. Syllogization, 52. Sagacity, 58. Shame, 135. 
Sympathy, 192. Self-regulation, 302. Self-sustinence, 438. Sadness, 
450. Swiftness, 459. Slowness, 460. Subjection, 468. 

Thankfulness, 444. Timidity, 448. 

Normal Faculty, 302. Nature of, 316. A Divine Element, 318. Merely 
the Intellect, 320. Only Emotional, 328. Introvertion of Thought, 332. 
A Growth or Habit, 338. A Regulating Power, 342. Author's 
Definition, 346. Inspired Ideas of, 349. Design and Authority, 363. 
Present Condition, 375. Unenlightened, 377. Perverted, 381. Torpid, 
387. Troubled, 393. Quiescent, 398. Restoration, 403. 

Wonder, 202. Will — Nature of, 234 ; Condition of, 249 \ Freedom of, 
259 5 Definitions of, 271 ; Relation to Morality, 291. 

Zeal, 209. 



Scrip tu ) 't ■ R eft 'rena 's . 



479 



PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE REFERRED TO OR 
EXPLAINED. 





OLD TES 

Page. 

340 


TAMENT. 


Page. 
351 




265 




351 




276 

272,277 

276 




273, 277 






351 






16 




276 




276 




20!) 




354 


Deuteronomy ii. 30 


272,277 

413,414 


xl. 8 


276 


„ ex. 3 


276 


„ x.10 


277 

413 


276 


„ x. 12 


„ cxix. 18 


381 


xi. 13 


413 

273,277 

27(1 




277 






352 


Judges v." 2 


Song of Solomon viii. 6 . . . 


209 


1 Samuel ii. 25 


274 


275,277 




351 


„ xix. 17 

„ xxx. 2, 9 


275,277 


2 Samuel vii. 18-29 


105 

352 


277,273 


„ xxiv. 10 




353 


1 Kings viii. 38 . . 


352 


liii. 10 


274,277 


1 Chronicles xxix. 9.. 


276 

275,277 

275 

276 

NEW TEt 

Page. 
Hg 




42 


2 Chronicles xxr. 16. 


„ xx. 9 


353 


„ xxx. 23 . . 


„ xxxi. 33 


• 413 


Nehemiah xi. 9 




270 


Matthew v. 44 


iTAMENT. 


Page. 
361 


viii. 3 


278 


iv. 2 


361 


., viii. 29 


366 


v. 2 


225 


,, xi. 27 


279 


y. 11 


361 


,, xxi. 29 


278 


xi 2 


209 


Mark xii. 30, 31 


..412,415,438 
278 




279 




i 19 


415 


„ xv. 12 


278 


iv. 24, 26 

vi 10 


350,450 

415 


John ii. 17, 23 


2Q9 442 


,, iii. 16 


'll8 




278 


„ v. 40 


278 




350 


„ v. 42 


121 


I Timothy i. 5 19 


360 


„ viii. 9 


359 




279 


Acts ii. 37 






3>i0 


„ viii. 31 


380 


i T 2 


361 


„ xv. 37 


278 




361 


., xviii. 15 


279 




3til 


„ xxiii. 1 


359 


ii 12 


470 


„ xxiv. 16 


.... 361 




279 


BomajQS ii. 15 


356-358 




356 


„ iii. 8 


ix. 9 14 


360 


„ vii. 18. &c 


267,278 


x 2 22 


360 


„ ix. 1 




360 


„ x. 2 . 






360 


„ xii. 11 






360 








279 


1 Corinthians viii. 7-12 . 


360 

3<il 

279 


ii 11 


366,415 


„ x. 25, £9 . 




267 


„ xii. 11. 


iii 90 21 


355 


xvi. 12 


279 


Jucle 9. 


366 



480 



Eminent Men. 



EMINENT MEN QUOTED OR REFERRED TO. 



Page. 

AGASSIZ 39 

Aischines 50 

Antoninus, M. A 319 

Aristotle 209. 362 

Amaziah 133 

Bain 93, 284 

Brown, Thomas 42, GL 328 

Brunei 54 

Bum van 55 

Butler 343 

Bonaparte 221 

C J2SAR 190 

Champollion 33 

Copernicus 35 

Campbell 112 

Charuock 335 

Chambers' Encyclopaedia 338 

Cicero 318 

Clarke 321-5 

Cousin 254 

Chrvsostom 342 

( larkson 3 )5 

Cud worth 320-2 

Davy, Sir H. 34 

Daniel t 83, 153 

David 105,120,173 

Demosthenes 50 

Descartes 235 

Edwards 239, 280 

Euclid 38 

Elijah 161 

Euripides 359 

Epictetus 319 

Ezekiel 83 

FAREL 215 

Goodwin 334 

Grotesfend 34 

Gibbon 49 

Herkchel, Sir J 64 

Hodge 247,291 

Hamilton, Sir W 42, 61, U, 8« 

Homer 55 

Hooker, Sir Jos 33 

Hume 328 



Page. 

Hierocles 342 

JOB 174 

Juvenal 368 

John 83 

KANT .... 42,63,64,322-5 

Leibnitz 238 

Leverrier 35 

Locke 236 

Loyola 384 

Luther 90 

McCOSH 60, 61, 

63, 99, 244, 249, 
294, 336, 343 

Mcintosh, Sir. 1 328 

Mill, J. S. 64 

Milton 55 

NAPOLEON III 133, 187 

Orange. Prinze of 89 

PALBY 338 

Pascal 41 

Price 321 

Plato 3G2 

QUAIFFE 297,337 

RAWLINSON 34 

Reid, Dr. T. 42.242,254 

SAUL Of Tarsus 213 

Sibbes 333 

Seneca 319 

Scott, Sir W. 55 

Shakespeare 55 

Smith, Dr. A. 328 

Solomon r >8,5!> 

Stewart, Dugald 99 

Way i, and 345 

Ward 333 

Webster, Dr. N 40,280,281 

Wellington 106 

Whitefield 446 

Wisdom, Bool? of 359 

Young, Dr. 33 



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